WHAT DOES "THE CHOSEN PEOPLE" MEAN TODAY?
Alan,
A teacher at our day school just stopped by my office and asked the question,
“Is there any official LCMS document that states that the Jews are not God’s
exclusively chosen people?” He’s been speaking with a member who believes that
the Jews are still as a nation/race God’s chosen people. Can you help me out?
I didn’t see anything on your web site so I thought I’d email you. Thanks for
whatever you have to offer.
Peace,
Pastor Scott Malme (Pilgrim Lutheran Church, Green Bay, WI)
PASTOR MALME,
When I read what you sent, I hear several questions: What does it mean to be
God's chosen people? What does it mean for those who are not chosen? Has God's
'choice' changed (broadened) over time? Are there 'official' LCMS documents on
these issues?
God chose Israel to "be a blessing" to "all peoples on earth". The Israelites
were to be a light to the Gentiles. Paul explains that the Jewish people were
"entrusted with the very words of God" (Romans 3), received the law, worshipped
in the Temple, served as prophets and were the human ancestors of Christ (Romans
9). But salvation has always come by faith alone. Being a descendant of Israel
was never enough, by itself, to give saving faith.
God's promises to his people are eternal and unchanging. Nothing has happened to
cause the Jewish people to cease being God's chosen people (and thus still called to be a light tot he lost gentiles), as this term was
used in the Hebrew Scriptures. What has changed is the long awaited Jewish
Messiah has come! We now know more about the mystery that God wants all people,
both Jew and Gentile, to be saved, through faith in Jesus. He has chosen from
among all people, Jew and Gentile, his elect, for salvation. Election is a very
different choosing and a very difficult subject! - ALAN BUTTERWORTH
A WRITER NAMED MARSHALL ASKS:
During my lunch with two evangelical friends, the subject of
missionaries came up. They, like me, abhor missionaries "to the Jews"
Alan Butterworth responds: I would be curious to hear about the basis for their faith. Could you put me in touch with them?
I apologize for my lengthy reply. You raise a lot of important issues:
1. Evangelical Christiains should abhor missions to the Jews.
Do you know where the word "evangelical" comes from? The Greek word in the New Covenant that it comes from means "Good News." Did Jesus teach that the Good News was about interfaith dialog with the Pharisees? Or Abhorring missionaries to the Jewish people, like Shimon (Peter)? Not exactly.
In the New Covenant the word evangelical refers to the specifc Good News that Jesus taught and fulfilled: that He came to suffer and die for the sins of all people, Jewish and Gentile.
If what we believe is true, why would we not want to share? If it is true, wouldn't withholding the truth about how to receive the free gift of eternal life be the greatest form of anti-Semitism?
Are you familiar with Michael Medved? He too is an Orthodox Jewish man. He too has many evangelical friends. He has no problem with their belief that Jesus is the only way to heaven. He understands that the desire of a Christian to see all people, Jewish and Gentile, receive the gift of eternal life thru faith in Jesus is not something he should fear. While he does not share their faith, he believes that the response of Jewish people to Christians who share their faith should not be fear, or to attack them or insist that they change their faith. He believes the answer is for Jewish people to learn more about Judaism. He also understands that Christians and Jewish people are allies in the war against those who believe in killing those who refuse to believe the same things they do.
The counter missionaries, like Yad L'achim, see the issue in eternal terms. They say believing in Jesus destroys a Jewish soul. Do you agree? If you agree, but you believe there is no afterlife, what exactly is the consequence of losing one's soul?
I don't understand the irrational fear that a Jewish soul is destroyed when a person confesses Faith in Jesus. How could that be? That is some powerful mojo! It is not what the Scriptures teach.
While it may be true that the third our fourth generation of a Jewish family that turns from Orthodox Judaism may not know they are Jewish, does this mean they have lost their soul?
and we discussed why missionaries are so insensitive and crass. One of
the answers he gave, and with which I completely agree, is that it's a
matter of perception. Missionaries cannot conceive of the fact that
while to them the cross is a symbol of love, faith and godliness, to the
Jew it is a symbol of murder, evil, paganism, persecution and
(figuratively) Satan. To the Jew, Jesus is a demi-god, not even on the
plane of Satan, but a figment that is the cause of 2,000 years of suffering.
2. Christians are Insensitive and Crass; Christians Caused 2,000 years of Jewish suffering.
People have all kinds of beliefs. Anyone can choose to take offense to anything. Does a bad experience justify condemning an entire group? Isn't that the way prejudice starts?
Belief in Jesus is not the same as being an apologist for what people have done in His name. The church has done horrible things to Jewish people and others throughout history. But is it fair to evaluate Christianity based on the worst things in history that have been done by people calling themselves Christians? Shouldn't Christianity be evaluated based on what it teaches?
The Scriptures say that before someone comes to faith, the message we preach is foolishness and an offense. They teach that it is only God that can help you understand.
I like to use the example of a group of men in San Francisco a few years ago who claimed that AIDs was a conspiracy of straight people and that AIDs did not exist. They couldn't stand what they were hearing about the disease and its cause and course and that they needed all kinds of medicine. So because the message was so offensive (I'm sure they thought it was crass), they stopped taking their medicine. What happened? They died.
Isn't the real question who defines crass? Which is more important: who may or may not be offended by what, or whether there is an absolute standard? To the Christian, the test for how we should act, the test for right and wrong, is the Scriptures. If you don't believe the standard should be the Scriptures, should what is crass be subject to a popular vote?
Can we agree that everyone should be free to believe whatever they want to believe as long as they do not do not harm others? I believe you have the right to reject what I believe and it is not right for anyone to force anyone else to believe anything.
Yeshua certainly did not force anyone to believe in Him. Even as he gave his life, he asked HaShem to forgive his killers because they didn't know what they were doing. He was clear: He did not come to be some kind of political leader or to condemn anyone. He came to save all people. From what? Sin!
Long before Yeshua, Daniel prophesied in the 12th chapter of his writings that a time of judgment was coming that would be horrible. He said some would be delivered, people whose names are written in the Book (of Life). Then: "Multitudes will rise from the dust of the earth: some to a place of everlasting life, and others to a place of shame and everlasting contempt."
Yom Kippur, Leviticus 16, is all about atonement for sin. It was the only sacrifice for ALL of the sin of the people. It was the only sacrifice for unconfessed sin.
Aren't cards still exchanged to wish that another's name may be inscribed in the Book of Life for a good year? What is the basis today for getting your name in the Book of Life today? Without a Temple, there can be no sacrifice (even as many practice schlugging kapporah), so how is sin atoned for? Why in the Siddur do the prayers ask HaShem to restore the Temple so the sacrifices may begin again? Why haven't these prayers been answered?
What happened to the prophecy in Haggai 2 that there would be greater peace in the second Temple than in the first? What about the prophecy in Daniel 9 that Messiah would come and atone for sin before the second Temple would be destroyed? Why does the Talmud say that during the last 40 years of the Temple (from about the year 30) that the sacrifices on Yom Kippur were not accepted by HaShem anymore?
Why was there so much clarity in the Scriptures about the reasons for the destruction of the first Temple, and even the length of the captivity, but no similar explanation about reasons for and the length of time the second Temple would remain destroyed?
Did the God who created the world suddenly abandon his Word? Is there anything in the Scriptures that supports the idea that we are now in a new age where we are now the judges of right and wrong?
3. To a Jewish Person, Christian Symbols are Symbols of Evil.
Belief that Yeshua is the Messiah is based on the Scriptures, not the symbols one may have. Is it not true that in any faith one may find a range of how many symbols the followers use?
I have friends who are Jewish believers in Jesus who refuse to set foot in churches because of what they perceive is idolatry: not because they worship the Messiah is divine, part of the triune God, but because they have graven images.
There are many believers in Yeshua who do not call themselves Christian because they are Jewish believers, and find the words Jesus and Christ to be 'loaded' with anti-Semitic history. Like many in the New Covenant Scriptures, they continue to be circumcised and to celebrate Jewish holidays based on the Scriptures. While they would like to believe that Jewish symbols may be more attractive to Jewish people, does this make the message that Yeshua is the Messiah, the once for all atonement for sin, less offensive?
On the other hand, if you believe they are no longer Jewish because they believe the Messiah has come, then doesn't it follow that either Rabbi Schneerson is the Messiah, or that his followers are also no longer Jewish?
4. Christians and the Holocaust.
Everyone needs to understand the holocaust. There is no defense of what happened. Survivors need our unconditional love. And God wants us to learn from what happened so it never happens again.
I have made contact with several holocaust museums. One of the purposes of holocaust museums is not being served by the current exhibits. There should be an exhibit about the role of people calling themselves Christians. And there should be an examination of the Scriptural or "Orthodox" Christian basis for the anti-Semitic actions of these people ... to reveal clearly that NONE of the anti-Semitism, the hatred, the violence, the persecution, the murders ... none of it is consistent with Christianity or the Scriptures. It cannot be called anything other than what it is ... sin.
Until we understand that Christianity may not be based on anything other than the Scriptures, we risk a repeat of the holocaust. The biggest problem in the German church today is that there has not been a full examination of the church's role in the holocaust. So many records are still sealed. Those who were involved have not repented and received God's forgiveness. Too many have chosen a very sad route: they have turned away from the Scriptures, ashamed of what Jesus taught because of what men have done.
What is taught by many today is not Orthodox Christianity, not a Christianity based on the Scriptures, and not a Christianity that teaches the self sacrifice that Jesus taught ... nor to love one's enemies. These teachings are superhuman. But our faith is not based on what we do, or earn, it is based solely on receiving the gift of faith in what God has already done. That is hard to accept ... it requires truly letting go of all reliance on one's own efforts and trusting God as revealed in his Word!
I believe the only way the church in Europe, and those who were involved in the holocaust, can truly learn and go forward is to fully examine what happened, repent and receive God's forgiveness. If the holocaust happened because people got AWAY from the Scriptures, what sense does it make for people in the church to respond to the holocaust by getting away from the Scriptures now?
There has to be more to Christianity than the gspels that were passed
down by the Catholic church and, my evangelical friends agree that
Christians will not fulfill their destiny until they understand that
Christianity is not an extension of Judaism but rather an expression of
the Jewish concept of God. Saul of Tarsus intended it as "Judaism for
Pagans", not as a primary religion.
I don't know what this means. Perhaps your friends would like to contact me?
All the lessons of the New Testament
are contained in the Hebrew Scriptures and teachings. Nothing in the New
Testament is new and nothing in the so-called Old Testament is old.
I agree. When Jesus talked about the Scriptures, the only ones that existed were the Hebrew Scriptures! These Scriptures said much about Yeshua and what he would do.
If you want an example, take a look at Isaiah 53. But I must warn you. If you read Isaiah 53, you might realize it was God's plan all along that Yeshua would suffer and die for our sin and rise from the dead.
It's
time for Christians to accept the laws of Noah and disabuse themselves
of such evil concepts as salvation solely through avowed belief.
5. Salvation Solely Through Avowed Belief is Not Biblical
Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me." The exclusive claims of Jesus are difficult. But by what standard do you believe this teaching is evil? Do you have a reference in the Hebrew Scriptures? At Genesis 15:6, Abraham trusted HaShem and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Was there any other god in whom men could place their faith and be declared righteous?
Christianity must accept the fact that there are no rewards for serving
God save for the satisfaction of serving Him. God does not want you to
have a Cadillac. God does not point a finger and "zot", your prayers are
answered.
Agreed!! The question is not whether there are rewards. The Scriptures teach we can't earn anything. The question is if God loves us and wants us to be with him and to serve him forever, as the Scriptures say, what happens if we turn our back on Him and His Book of Life? What does the Jewish prophet Daniel say will happen if our name is not in the Book of Life?
Name it and claim it teachers have as much impact on Christianity as the rabbis who went to Tehran to support the little Iranian who denies the holocaust have on Judaism.
I can't speak for God but I sincerely believe that serving Him is its
own reward. This is a Chassidic concept and I think it is true.
I don't disagree. The question is how do we know if we are serving God? What is your authority? If it is how a person feels or thinks, is this not this subject to more abuse than a faith based on writings that God Himself claims to have given us?
You can challenge me on my faith based on whether my faith is consistent with the Scriptures. We are called to challenge our teachers based on the Scriptures ... as opposed to following them as they criticize the Scriptures. If the Scriptures are not the basis of your faith, or just some passages at some times, are you ready for whatever consequences follow from being the judge of whether a teaching in the Scriptures or somewhere else is true?
Serving
God for possible rewards in this life or in some fantasy afterlife is
fraught with danger. That is what has made Christianity and Islam so
hazardous and why Judaism has survived despite the slings and arrows
cast by its wannabe imitators.
,\\
Marshall, I care about you. During the holocaust, true Christians cared about Jewish neighbors, as the Scriptures taught. I have a Gentile neighbor who was a young boy living outside the camp at Treblinka. His family understood their faith to mean they had to hide Jewish people and they did. His brother was a teacher and the Nazis hated what he taught so he was put in a camp. This is what Christianity teaches ... to love your enemy.
Even as we disagree about many things, I still hope we will be able to get together in June for a beer!
Shalom!
Alan Butterworth
Missionary,
Is Christianity anti-Semitic?
I've been exposed to Anne Coulter's opinion and as far as I am concerned, she is exercising her required duty as a Christian. I don't happen to like that duty but I understand her motivation. So as far as I am concerned, she can spout the words which only confirm the evil of her religion but I only hope that no Jews succumb to missionizing. - M.
I am sorry that you believe that Christianity is evil. I don't know if I have told you before, but I really appreciate your willingness to share with me so openly. I know I have, and will continue to, learn a lot from you.
The horrible things Christians have done is a different issue than the basis for our faith (the Scriptures) and what we believe. May I explain?
Christianity is based on the Scriptures. When someone claiming to be a Christian does not act according to the Scriptures, that person's biggest problem is between him and God. The church also has a responsibility to confront such behavior (see Matthew 18).
When it comes to the past, I would love to work with you to expose what has happened so everyone can learn. There is no excuse what was done.
But when people who claim to follow a faith act stupidly, or contrary to the teachings of the faith, does that change the nature of the faith? When King David committed adultery and murder, did that change who God is or what the Bible teaches? When Jewish Rabbis go to a conference in Iran with Ahmadinijad to deny the holocaust, does this change Judaism or the validity of Judaism? Or does this say more about these rabbis than about Judaism?
There is no rational human being who can disagree with you that people calling themselves Christians have done horrible things to Jewish people, even in the name of Jesus. This is a horrible tragedy, indefensible and should not be forgotten! I believe we should add a section to holocaust museums about this stuff... I actually propose this regularly to the museums and Rabbis... I suppose it is a bit of a hot potato... how will people learn if Christians don't face our history?
I believe that in Europe, the holocaust was never faced by the church or its people. The result is a twisted form of Christianity that no longer sees sharing the Gospel as its duty. To get there, because they did not want to face the truth and repent, they had to abandon chunks of the Scriptures and change their faith.
The real problem is we have NOT shown the light of day to ALL of the records after the war. I am certain the story is worse that many in the church want to believe... but I believe it is critical to get this out in the open for two reasons... those who committed the attrocties (individuals and organizations) need to repent, make appropriate changes and seek God's forgiveness, and everyone else needs to learn from what happened so this will never happen again.
I am optomistic about the future of the true church (people who do hold to the Scriptures) when it comes to NOT repeating the attrocities of the holocaust, etc. Why? After the Passion movie, Abe Foxman and many others were surprised there was not more anti-semitic incidents. I believe the reason for this is that more Christians are reading the Bible! There is a correlation. The "German Church" during the holocaust had to get rid of almost the entire Bible because they could not accept the truth: that Jesus was Jewish!
The question for me is always the same. What is the authority for your beliefs? The anti-Semite comes to the Bible with presuppositions and proceeds to remove from the Bible whatever differs from his preconceptions. Does this mean you should do the same?
When I encounter a Christian who says we should not share the Gospel with Jewish people, I ask them for the authority for their belief. It is NEVER based on the Bible.
The Scriptures do not teach anything anti-Semitic unless you believe that a Jewish person confessing faith in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah is bad. Logically, how could this be worse than a Jewish person confessing faith as a pagan (Buddhist, Hindu, etc), or as an atheist, or that someone else (like Schneerson) is the Messiah?
I do not agree that a Jewish person who confesses faith in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah loses their identity as a Jewish person. (My understanding of Orthodox Judaism is that such a person is an apostate, but is still Jewish and can 'repent' before they die). I know many Jewish people who have become much more Jewish after coming to believe that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah.
Some tell me I want to destroy Jewish souls. This comes from a misunderstanding. Christian baptism comes from Judaism... it is really cleansing in the mikveh. The concept of baptism is the same: purifying someone in the name of God through the Promise in His Word.
If I was to convert to Judaism, as you keep talking about, I would, at the end of the process, go into a mikveh, and come up out of the waters... Jewish. Many Jewish people believe that when a Jewish person confesses faith in Jesus, and gets baptized, he or she comes up out of the waters of baptism... Christian AND Gentile (ie. no longer Jewish). I have never seen anything in the Scriptures that supports the idea that believing in Jesus destroys Jewish identity.
In fact, the opposite is true. The early followers of Jesus believed you had to be circumcised (ie Jewish) to believe in Jesus (see Acts 10-11). After all, he was the Jewish Messiah. God showed Peter that Jesus was not only the Jewish Messiah, but also for the Gentiles! Peter did not stop being Jewish nor did many other followers of Jesus. They worshipped in the Temple, were Torah observant, celebrated the Jewish holidays, and permitted Gentiles to worship and believe in Jesus by keeping only the Noachide laws (Acts 15).
I admit that a great deal of anti-Semitism worked its way into the church. You will get no argument from me on this. But we (thru our partner ministry, the Caspari Center) are engaged in scholarship to get the truth out about how influential Jewish believers in Jesus were for centuries. And yet, when the pogroms started, even in Alexandria, Jewish believers in Jesus were not exempt from the disease that is anti-Semitism.
I am committed to helping open up this history and get the church to face what happened. I believe you and I agree about how horrible that was (and still is in some places, like Russia and Germany). For me, anti-Semitism is all the worse when it is done in the name of the church. That is heresy and an abomination!
If you separate the historic anti-semitism of the church from the Scriptures for a moment (since it is NOT supported AT ALL by the Scriptures) and just consider whether you can be Jewish and believe in Jesus based on the Scriptures, I would like to understand your thoughts on just this question.
Shalom!
Alan Butterworth
Missionary,
What do Jewish people believe about the Lineage of the Messiah?
Here are Alan Butterworth's thoughts on what Jewish people believe today about the lineage of
Messiah (Christ):
There is no single Jewish response to a question like this. The opinions are
varied. Most Jewish people today are not looking for the Messiah to come. Many
are atheist (we have an atheist or humanist synagogue near us in Sarasota), or
agnostic, many more do not believe that the Hebrew Scriptures (what we call the
Old Testament) is the inspired Word of God... so most Jewish people are not
looking for anything special or at best, for a Messianic Age, not a Messiah.
It is, for the most part, only the Orthodox and some Conservative Jewish people
who are waiting for the Messiah. And even among these groups, there are large
numbers of Jewish people who believe that the Messiah came and died (or
disappeared)in 1994, and they are waiting for him to rise from the dead (or
return). There may be a big news story soon as factions of this group have been
fighting about whether Rabbi Schneerson is actually dead or not. There is a
lawsuit working thru the Courts in NY about a sign that referred to him in
Hebrew terms equivalent to the English phrase “of blessed memory.”. It was torn
down by those who believe he is not dead... It is interesting that this group,
known as Chabad, continues to grow worldwide, as they wait for the Rebbe to
return.
So that leaves a relatively small number of Jewish people who are truly waiting
for the Messiah. When I talk to such people, I ask "How will we know when he
comes?" We asked this question as we went door to door in a Houston Orthodox
neighborhood... the answers vary, but rarely would such a person be swayed by
genealogy. For almost all of these people, there is an authority they follow
called the Talmud, which they claim is inspired, known as the Oral tradition at
the time of Jesus, that teaches no matter what, Jesus is not the Messiah.
There is a tiny group of Jewish people, called Kararites, mostly in Israel, who
are waiting for the Messiah and do not believe the Talmud is authoritative...
they would be the most open to proof of fulfillment of Biblical Messianic
prophesy. As you might expect, they have not yet been convinced that Jesus
fulfills the prophesies, including the genealogy. They are quite knowledgeable
in the Bible, and it is quite challenging to interact with them.
If you compare the genealogies in Matthew and Luke, you will see some
significant differences. If you compare either to the Hebrew Scriptures, you
will see yet other problems... much has been written to try and resolve these
differences, but counter-missionaries and knowledgeable Jewish people may raise
these problems. If you are not prepared, they may cause you to wonder or doubt.
But like any other objection to the Messiahship of Jesus that is outside of your
knoweldge, there is something you can do... ask the person this question: "If I
answer your objection, or question, to your satisfaction, will you consider
whether Jesus is the Messiah?" If they say no, you have reached the end of that
day's conversation about Jesus. If they say yes, then you can approach your
pastor and others for the resources to provide to your friend so that you may
share the truth with as much detail as is necessary.
Many people are seeking the perfect Scripture or approach to win Jewish people
to the Gospel. Before putting our hope in these things, we need to remember
that this is a spiritual battle. The Bible says that Jewish people's hearts are
hard so that we, the Gentiles, can come to faith in the Messiah. There is a
spiritual element of this hardness that has been a part of God's plan since Deut
32:15-21. Paul talks about it at Romans 11:25, suggesting that at the end, this
hardness will not exist any more, and after the full number of Gentiles has come
in, Jewish people will be able to respond to the Gospel.
I say this not to discourage you from praying for or sharing with a Jewish
person. After all, Romans 11:25 says the hardness is only in part. There
always have been and always will be a faithful remnant of Jewish believers.
I often think of myself as a spiritual geologist, seeing all different sizes and
shapes of hardened hearts. When a person has a hard heart, they can't
understand the truth. But the Gospel is powerful! Our job is to share, pray
and ask the Holy Spirit to draw them to faith!
Lord willing, the Jewish person you are praying for will receive the gift of
eternal life before it is too late!
Do the Jewish people believe in the same God as Christians?
A few years ago, I [Steve Cohen] attended the installation of Rev. Robert Roegner to the position of Director of World Missions for the Lutheran Church- Missouri Synod. Bob and I have a lot in common in that we are members of the same church, Jan and I nearly purchased his home when we moved to St. Louis, both of our youngest children will be in the same confirmation class, we both like to eat and we share a passion for reaching the lost with the Gospel. He is also one of the members of the Board of Directors for The Apple of His Eye.
The dynamic and highly animated guest preacher that morning was Rev. Dr. Paul K. Flynn, President of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Ghana. He exudes a passion for reaching the lost. He spoke on the text from Phillipians 2:1-11 reminding the standing-room only filled chapel that our positions of service are one of humility – but sometimes our positions could trap us as we project a Superiority Syndrome. We in the church are better than they… and fill in the blank. Or we who are in leadership position are better than… fill in that blank.
Sometimes that syndrome presents itself sporting the cloak of good works or presenting right doctrine…. Left me shift gears and see if I can illustrate...
A deeply troubling issue surfaced in the wake of the September 11th attacks. Many Christians are seeking information about the Muslims and Jewish people and their beliefs. Seeking information is indeed a good and proper pursuit and we all can learn more. However, I heard a radio host on the talk show Issues, etc. ask this question of his guest, a Jewish Lutheran pastor: Is the God the Jewish people worship the true God? The response given to and accepted without challenge by the host: No! Because the Jewish people do not accept the trinity, they therefore do not worship the true God.
Well, on the surface, one might think… hmmm, this seems to make sense. I readily admit that I am not an in-depth master of philosophical or theological reasoning. However there is an obvious flaw in the response given: This definition of who is the true God is deduced NOT in the nature of God… but in the responsiveness of the Jewish people.
A review of Romans chapters 9-11 will help move the discussion along. Perhaps you may want to stop at this point and read with a critical eye those chapters and then continue with my article.
God reveals himself in the Old Testament as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the true and living God: God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you. ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers — the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob — has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation. Exodus 3:14-15
Paul pauses in his discourse with the intent of urging his gentile audience to have compassion for and bring the Gospel to Israel (the Jewish people): Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. Romans 10:1.
Paul clearly proclaims that salvation for ANY person, is NOT by any work, but by the grace and mercy of God through faith: What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the “stumbling stone.” As it is written: “See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” Romans 9:30-33
Unbelieving Israel is on a path to destruction because they have sought to establish their relationship with God by works of the law, not through faith. For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes. Moses describes in this way the righteousness that is by the law: “The man who does these things will live by them.” Romans 10: 2-5
How then is anyone saved? The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame. For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile — the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” Romans 10:8-13
So the issue of who God is can never be defined by whether one receives Christ or not… God is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). Salvation is clearly at stake and only found through faith in Y’shua. Jews and gentiles who believe are saved, Jews and gentiles who do not believe are not.
Paul continues: Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ. But I ask: Did they not hear? Of course they did: “Their voice has gone out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.” Again I ask: Did Israel not understand? First, Moses says, “I will make you envious by those who are not a nation; I will make you angry by a nation that has no understanding.” Romans 10:17-19
The Gospel was first brought to the Lost Sheep of Israel. The first followers of Jesus were Jewish, the disciples were Jewish, the authors of the whole Bible with the possible exception of Luke were Jewish. In fact, the debate raged in Acts 15 about whether gentiles should first become Jewish in order to follow their Messiah. The Holy Spirit made it clear that they did not. But as gentiles grew in numbers in response to the Gospel brought to them by the Jewish people, they in turn have an important responsibility… to provoke Israel to jealousy because of their faith.
What then? What Israel sought so earnestly it did not obtain, but the elect did. The others were hardened, as it is written: “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes so that they could not see and ears so that they could not hear, to this very day.” And David says: “May their table become a snare and a trap, a stumbling block and a retribution for them. May their eyes be darkened so they cannot see, and their backs be bent forever.” Again I ask: Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all! Rather, because of their transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious.
But if their transgression means riches for the world, and their loss means riches for the Gentiles, how much greater riches will their fullness bring! I am talking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I make much of my ministry in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them. For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead? If the part of the dough offered as firstfruits is holy, then the whole batch is holy; if the root is holy, so are the branches.
If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, do not boast over those branches. If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.” Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but be afraid. For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either. Romans 11:7-21
As a missionary, this is one of the deep spiritual mysteries I contend with… God has chosen to blind Israel in part. This means that some will respond in faith and have from the days of Jesus to this very day. But WHY did God harden their hearts? In order that salvation would be extended to the gentiles.
To claim that the Jewish people do not worship the true God reflects clearly a superiority syndrome… we have it right and the Jews have it wrong. Yet Paul issues a stern warning: do not boast but be afraid for the gentiles could be “not spared” too.
Rev. Dave Born, the Chairman of our Board of Directors puts it this way, As to the God of Israel to whom Jews pray, I believe He is the True Father God. Because there is not faith in Jesus, however, the gospel relationship with this Father is not possible beyond a relationship of law which is neither salvific nor satisfying. For those who seek the truth and pray to the Father outside of Jesus' name, I believe would be included among those of whom Jesus proclaimed "not FAR from the Kingdom”.
Since it was God who hardened of the heart, how then can any Christian today claim that the Jews do not worship the true God? There is only ONE God… While unbelieving Israel faces eternal damnation because of sin, that was true even before the incarnation and resurrection of Jesus. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God!
Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree! I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. Romans 11:22-25
Paul makes it clear, God is able to graft unbelieving Jewish people them back in again. How can this be done? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. This means for the obedient Christian, in love and with prayer, we take the initiative to bring a hearing of the Word of God to the Jewish people. This must be done intentionally and with a sense of urgency for once death takes place there is no second chance.
The superiority syndrome leads people to make claims and boast of their faith and thus in doing so end up in putting down others who lack faith. Paul called for humility recognizing that we all are sinners saved by grace through faith. As such, I believe we should not erect unnecessary barriers! We must all enable a clear hearing of the Gospel and do what we can to demonstrate God’s love with genuine compassion and concern.
Jesus said, “ I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me.” John 14:6. Those words were first spoken to my people. God said it and that settles it. So let’s tell others before it is too late. Enough with the quibbling already!
Is it LEGAL to do evangelism in Israel?
We regularly receive calls and correspondence that people know for a fact that it is against the law to witness in Israel. People who have gone on tours have been told ahead of time that they should not bring any literature to distribute so that there would not be any illegal activities. This is just plain wrong.
The answer is YES. You can share your faith openly and publicly.
Well, we wanted to set the record straight, and not from our mouths, but from a very reliable source in the land of Israel – Haaretz Newspaper….
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421251&contrassID=2&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y
Continuation of Do unto your neighbor
Conditional tolerance
Very few people in Arad are standing by the Messianic Jews. "Expel them from here immediately," demands Udi Asher, a kiosk owner in the town's large commercial center. The center is empty on this blazing hot afternoon, and Asher seems to be waiting for an opportunity to get mad. "Some woman came here, bought nuts and gave me a New Testament. I wanted to throw her out of the store. I restrained myself, but I didn't understand what she was after. She knows I'm Jewish, so why did she try to convert me? If they're allowed to do that, then so are the Haredim. It's a war of survival. We have to preserve a Jewish character in the town. I still have a limitation in my brain: I don't want to live next to a Christian or next to a Muslim."
Arad has a population of 26,000, with an unemployment rate of 9.6 percent (as compared with the national average of 10.9 percent). Some 40 percent of the residents are new immigrants, mainly from the former Soviet Union. There is a large Haredi population - 300 families of the Gur hasidic sect, 50 or so Chabad families, and another 50 families that support the ultra-Orthodox Shas Sephardi party. In the past few years Arad has changed from a town that traditionally supported Labor to a bastion of the right. In the 1996 elections, Labor won 30 percent of the vote, Likud 22.9 percent, and in 1999, Ehud Barak, Labor's candidate for prime minister, received 64 percent of the vote, nearly 30 percent more than the Likud candidate, Benjamin Netanyahu (35.9 percent). The turnabout occurred in 2001: Ariel Sharon won 58.7 percent of the vote, Barak only 41.2 percent. In 2003, the Likud took about 62 percent of the vote, as against only 21.3 percent for Labor.
Labor also sustained a defeat in the municipal elections last November, when Dr. Motti Bril, an independent candidate who is considered to have a right-wing orientation, defeated Labor's Bezalel Tabib, who was mayor for 15 years. The Messianic Jews settled in Arad during Tabib's tenure. "I never felt their presence," the former mayor says. "I heard about them when someone came to me three years ago and said that they were here and were holding meetings in someone's house. It wasn't a complaint. He said they were very nice. It's true that they talk about the Christian cause, but they are also happy and they sing and talk about love. Every person has the right to do what he wants in his home. It didn't bother me."
The new mayor takes a different approach to the subject. "They are not being persecuted. In what way are they persecuted?" Bril asks. "They come to the place and operate on the fringe of the law that bans missionary activity. We treat them politely and with due courtesy, but they are far from being complete tzadikim [saintly people]. There is a group of Haredim that says they already broke the law when they distributed food to Holocaust survivors ahead of Pesach and placed a copy of the New Testament and some money in the package."
They deny that.
"In the meantime I am not taking action and not doing anything against them. I don't have enough evidence to act against them, so I am not taking any active steps. On the day they cross the line the municipality of Arad will use all its might to expel them. If I had something that is absolute proof, they wouldn't be in Arad. Because I don't, I am tolerant. In the meantime, they are on the borderline but they are far from being persecuted saints. We're on the threshold of a struggle. A group arrives that tries to do something else, and they are allowed to proceed up to a certain limit, but only up to a certain limit. This is a very tolerant city, but missionary activity is against the law. As long as we're in the gray area, we're not bothering with them."
So, to maintain the municipal coalition you prefer to ignore the harassment of the Messianic Jews?
"People are allowed to hold a demonstration next to private homes. It's not pleasant, not conventional, not ordinary, but it's allowed. And it has nothing to do with the municipal coalition. There are people who think that what they are doing is bad and they are demonstrating next to their homes. What's wrong with that?"
Yitzhak Benishti, a Labor Party representative on the municipal council, also objects to the presence of the Messianic Jews. "I'm against all this messianic organizing, I'm not in favor and I don't support them. These are Jews who are engaged in missionary activity."
That's a rumor being spread by the Haredim, but there's no proof of it, is there?
"That's why I say that if they are engaging in missionary activity, I am against. I am not intervening in the matter."
If there's no proof of missionary activity, why shouldn't you intervene to protect them?
"The truth is that I am against holding demonstrations across from private homes and bothering the neighbors. All the neighbors are already very upset."
And what about the Messianic Jews - they are also very upset, aren't they?
"I just haven't been in Arad for the past two weeks. I will consider intervening in their favor. I will definitely consider it."
What the law says
Sergei Bikhovsky, a representative of the centrist, anticlerical party Shinui on the municipal council, and the party's top official in the south, says he is torn between the law - "For me the law is the most important thing, and the law says that missionary activity is forbidden" - and the people themselves, "who are very nice and have even opened a chess club for immigrants from the former Soviet Union. I'm in a really bad spot."
But aren't they in an even worse spot?
"The action taken by the Haredim is not right. The way they reacted isn't so nice."
Gabi Bahan, who was a representative of the liberal Meretz party on the previous municipal council (Meretz does not have a representative on the current council), objects to the Haredi demonstrations. "The rabbis here are conducting illegitimate politics by taking advantage of the Messianic Jews," he says. "It's very easy for a large group to exploit a minority group to crystallize itself. The Messianic Jews live their lives and don't make themselves felt. The question is who the missionary is here. The Gur hasidic sect built a school for secular children to get them to become religious. The town should be pluralistic. The greater the diversity, the stronger we will be as a community."
Nevertheless, Bahan has so far done nothing to protect the Messianic Jews. Maybe he'll write an article for the local weekly, he says. Eitan Michaeli, a resident of Arad and the deputy director of the Be'er Sheva branch of Shatil - which defines itself as "a capacity-building center for grassroots social change organizations" - was also a Meretz representative on the last council. And he has already written an article for the local paper. "It's hard to do more than that," he says. "Arad has become a place where it's very difficult to mobilize people. In the past, people here voted for Mapai [forerunner of Labor], Dash [the defunct Democratic Movement for Change, a centrist party] and for Meretz, but in the past few years the Likud and Shas have become stronger. It's a pity that the rabbis don't understand that they are playing with a double-edged sword. Just as they are now inciting against the Messianic Jews, tomorrow people will incite against them. They are fanning the flames and in the end they will be burned."
The head of the local Likud branch, Moshe Edri, says that he has read the law - "and I hope the mayor will act according to the law and thus resolve the problem."
Won't the problem be resolved if the Haredim are prevented from harassing the Messianic Jews?
"I don't see that anyone is harassing them. I would suggest that there be no missionary activity in any city in this country."
Three sections of the Penal Code deal with missionary activity.
According to Par. 174(A), anyone "who gives or promises a person money, the equivalent value of money or any other material benefit in order to entice him to change his religion or so that he will entice someone else to change his religion, shall be imprisoned for five years or pay a fine of 50,000 [Israel] pounds." Par. 174(B) states that anyone who receives material benefits in order to convert is liable to a prison term of three years and a fine of 300,000 pounds. And Par. 368 stipulates that anyone who conducts a conversion ceremony for someone who is under-aged is liable to six months in prison.
In December 2001, the Knesset's Constitution, Law and Justice Committee voted down a bill by MK Moshe Gafni (United Torah Judaism), which would have imposed a three-month prison term on anyone who tried to cajole someone to convert by means of the mail or by fax. "I have a small boy at home, who could receive missionary material by mail, by fax or by e-mail," Gafni told the committee. "I'd be interested to know why you receive this kind of thing but I don't," wondered MK Ophir Pines-Paz (Labor). "I have spoken about this to the director of the postal service many times, and piles of this material arrive," Gafni said.
In recent years the Knesset has held only a few discussions on the subject of missionary activity. In one of the most exhaustive discussions, held by the Interior Committee in November 1999, Inspector Yosef Cohen, an officer with the police Investigations Branch, warned against militant persecution of the Christian sects in Israel. "The U.S. administration itself closely monitors the law-enforcement authorities in Israel in regard to persecution of what it calls religious sects, as the messianic sects in the United States have a very powerful lobby in the administration," Cohen said. "Therefore, as with any other law, the law-enforcement authorities in Israel should be especially careful and adopt an attitude that is completely legal, no less and no more."
Cohen also cited some interesting statistics. During the 1990s, he said, the police received between 10 and 20 complaints concerning offenses relating to religious conversion. However, the members of the messianic sects, he said, had submitted no fewer than 60 complaints against Yad L'Achim. "I would expect organizations engaged in guarding the Jewish public against Christian preaching not to resort to violent activity," he noted.
Constant fear
H., a lawyer, is very fearful of the Haredi activity in Arad. She is a 41-year-old single mother with three children. She refuses to divulge any details that might disclose her identity, but agreed to meet with me at the Arad shopping mall. She doesn't meet with strangers in her home, she explained, so that they won't find out where she lives. Her children try not to say anything about her religious beliefs to their friends, so as to spare her harassment.
She became a Messianic Jew two years ago, she says. "For many years I searched for God," she says. "In the course of the search I also became close to the Haredim. A few years ago I even became a regular donor to a Haredi radio station, and I wore long skirts, went to the mikveh [ritual bath] and read three chapters of Psalms every day."
One of her neighbors in Herzliya, where she lived, was a Messianic Jew. "She read me chapters from the Bible. It scared me, but I was also attracted to it. It responded to a lot of things that were bothering me." H. told hardly anyone about her new faith. "My mother knows. We have long arguments. She is a Holocaust survivor. My father doesn't know to this day. The father of my three children became very frightened. He was certain that harm would befall the children. He calmed down only after seeing that nothing happened to the children. My brother learned about it only recently."
Relatives who know about her belief sometimes harass her no less than the Haredim. "My son went to visit someone in the family who knows. My son was wearing a crown that he received from a fast-food restaurant. The crown had illustrations of crosses on it. The relative was so frightened that he cut out the crosses."
Her faith is a private matter, she says. "How can I be a missionary if I hardly talk about the subject with anyone? A friend expressed interest, and I gave him a book to read. He returned the book and said he's not interested in these subjects and that was the end of the conversation. In the past few months I took a course given by the Labor Ministry, and no one there knew I am a Messianic Jew. As far as I'm concerned, it's a private spiritual process. If I don't share it with even those who are closest to me, why would I share it with others?"
For the past few weeks she has been gripped by fear. "It was a bad surprise for me to find out that there are religious wars in Arad. It sounds absurd. It's a small, quiet, lovely town. When I was a girl we spent summer vacations here, and when my mother retired she dreamed of coming back here - which is why I came to Arad a year ago. Who believed it would happen here? We know that we can expect more persecution. We will accept it the way Gandhi did in India, with passive resistance. We will not leave this place. We believe we are doing a good thing for Arad. I pray that there will be an economic boom in Arad. I remember better days here. When I was a girl, there was the Masada Hotel, today it's a heap of rubble. In the winter I prayed for rain in Arad.
To secular eyes, you very much resemble the Haredim.
"That's true. There's a saying that we met our enemies and they are us. The sharpest clashes are with those who are like you."
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What is Shavout?
Shavuot, sometimes pronounced Shavuos (Hebrew: שבועות; Israeli Heb. [ʃa·vu·'ʕot]; Ashkenazi [ʃə·'vu·əs]; "[Feast of] Weeks"), is a Jewish holiday that occurs on the sixth day of the Hebrew month of Sivan, corresponding to late May or early June. It marks the conclusion of the Counting of the Omer and the day the Torah was given at Mount Sinai. It is one of the shalosh regalim, the three Biblical pilgrimage festivals mandated by the Torah.
Unlike the other two pilgrimage festivals, Passover and Sukkot, the date of Shavuot is not explicitly mentioned in the Torah. Rather, its occurrence is directly linked to the date of Passover. The Torah mandates the seven-week Counting of the Omer, beginning on the second day of Passover and culminating on the 50th day, Shavuot. This counting of days and weeks expresses anticipation and desire for the Giving of the Torah. At Passover, the Jewish people were freed from being slaves to Pharaoh; at Shavuot they accepted the Torah and became a nation committed to serving God.
Shavuot has many aspects and as a consequence is called by several names. In the Torah it is called Feast of Weeks (Hebrew: חג השבועות, Hag ha-Shavuot, Exodus 34:22, Deuteronomy 16:10); Festival of Reaping (Hebrew: חג הקציר, Hag ha-Katsir, Ex. 23:16), and Day of the First Fruits (Hebrew יום הבכורים, Yom ha-Bikkurim, Numbers 28:26). The Mishnah and Talmud refer to Shavuot as Atzeret (Hebrew: עצרת, a solemn assembly), as it provides closure for the festival activities during and following the holiday of Passover. Since Shavuot occurs 50 days after Passover, Christians gave it the name Pentecost (πεντηκόστη, "fiftieth [day]"). However, the actual Christian commemoration of Pentecost occurs on the seventh Sunday after Easter.
In the Land of Israel and among Reform and Karaite Jews, Shavuot is celebrated for one day. In the Jewish diaspora outside Israel, the holiday is celebrated for two days, on the sixth and seventh days of Sivan.
Connection with the harvest
Besides its significance as the day on which the Torah was given by God to the Jewish nation at Mount Sinai, Shavuot is also connected to the season of the grain harvest in Israel. In ancient times, the grain harvest lasted seven weeks and was a season of gladness (Jer. 5:24; Deut. 16:9-11; Isa. 9:2). It began with the harvesting of the barley during Passover and ended with the harvesting of the wheat at Shavuot. Shavuot was thus the concluding festival of the grain harvest, just as the eighth day of Sukkot (Tabernacles) was the concluding festival of the fruit harvest. During the existence of the Temple in Jerusalem, an offering of two loaves of bread from the wheat harvest was made on Shavuot (Lev. 23:15-21).
Ceremony of Bikkurim
Shavuot was also the first day on which individuals could bring the Bikkurim (first fruits) to the Temple in Jerusalem (Mishnah Bikkurim 1:3). The Bikkurim were brought from the Seven Species for which the Land of Israel is praised: wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates (Deut. 8:8). In the largely agrarian society of ancient Israel, Jewish farmers would tie a ribbon around the first ripening fruits from each of these species in their fields. At the time of harvest, the fruits identified by the ribbon would be cut and placed into baskets woven of gold and silver. The baskets would then be placed on oxen whose horns were gilded and laced with garlands of flowers, and who were led in a grand procession to Jerusalem. As the farmer and his entourage passed through cities and towns, they would be accompanied by music and parades.
At the Temple, each farmer would present his Bikkurim to a kohen in a ceremony that followed the text of Deut. 26:1-10. This text begins by stating, "An Aramean tried to destroy my father," referring to Laban's efforts to weaken Jacob and rob him of his progeny (Rashi on Deut. 26:5)—or by an alternate translation, the text states "My father was a wandering Aramean," referring to the fact that Jacob was a penniless wanderer in the land of Aram for 20 years (ibid., Abraham ibn Ezra). The text proceeds to retell the history of the Jewish people as they went into exile in Egypt and were enslaved and oppressed; following which God redeemed them and brought them to the land of Israel. The ceremony of Bikkurim conveys the Jew's gratitude to God both for the first fruits of the field and for His guidance throughout Jewish history (Scherman, p. 1068).
Modern observances
Shavuot is unlike other Jewish holidays in that it has no prescribed mitzvot (Torah commandments) other than the traditional festival observances of abstention from work, special prayer services and holiday meals. However, it is characterized by many minhagim (customs) that have taken on the force of law in traditional Jewish circles. A mnemonic for these customs is the letters of the Hebrew word acharit (אחרית, "last"). Since the Torah is called reishit (ראשית, "first"), the customs of Shavuot highlight the importance of custom for the continuation and preservation of Jewish religious observance.
These customs, largely observed in Ashkenazic communities, are:
אקדמות – Akdamut, the reading of a liturgical poem during Shavuot morning synagogue services
חלב – Chalav (milk), the consumption of dairy products like milk and cheese
רות – Ruth, the reading of the Book of Ruth at morning services
ירק – Yerek, the decoration of homes and synagogues with greenery
תורה – Torah, engaging in all-night Torah study.
Akdamut
This liturgical poem extolling the greatness of God, the Torah and Israel is read publicly in the synagogue right before the morning reading of the Torah on the first day of Shavuot. It was composed by Rabbi Meir of Worms, whose son was murdered during the Crusade of 1096. Rabbi Meir was forced to defend the Torah and his Jewish faith in a debate with local priests, and successfully conveyed his certainty of God's power, His love for the Jewish people, and the excellence of Torah. Afterwards he wrote Akdamut, a 90-line poem in Aramaic which stresses these themes. The poem is written in a double acrostic pattern according to the order of the Hebrew alphabet. In addition, each line ends with the syllable "ta" (תא), the last and first letters of the Hebrew alphabet, alluding to the endlessness of Torah. The traditional melody which accompanies this poem also conveys a sense of grandeur and triumph.
Sephardim do not read akdamut, but before the evening service they sing a poem called Azharot which sets out the 613 Biblical commandments. The positive commandments are recited on the first day and the negative commandments on the second day.
Dairy foods
All types of sweetened dairy foods, such as cheese-filled blintzes (shown frying in pan) and cheesecakes are usually served on Shavuot. Dairy foods such as cheesecake and cheese-filled blintzes are traditionally served on Shavuot. One explanation for the consumption of dairy foods on this holiday is that the Israelites had not yet received the Torah, with its laws of shechita (ritual slaughtering of animals). As the food they had prepared beforehand was not in accordance with these laws, they opted to eat simple dairy meals to honor the holiday. Some say it harks back to King Solomon's portrayal of the Torah as "honey and milk are under your tongue" (Song of Songs 4:11). [1].
Book of Ruth
Each of the five books of the Tanakh known as Megillot (Hebrew: מגילות, "scrolls") is publicly read in the synagogue on a different Jewish holiday. The Book of Lamentations, which details the destruction of the Holy Temple, is the reading for Tisha B'Av; the Book of Ecclesiastes, which touches on the ephemeralness of life, corresponds to Sukkot; the Book of Esther (Megillat Esther) retells the events of Purim; and the Song of Songs, which echoes the themes of springtime and God's love for the Jewish people, is the reading for Passover.
The Book of Ruth (מגילת רות, Megillat Ruth) corresponds to the holiday of Shavuot both in its descriptions of the barley and wheat harvest seasons and Ruth's desire to become a member of the Jewish people, who are defined by their acceptance of the Torah. Moreover, the lineage described at the end of the Book lists King David as Ruth's great-grandson. According to tradition, David was born and died on Shavuot (Sha'arei Teshuvah to Orach Hayyim, 494).
Greenery
According to the Midrash, Mount Sinai suddenly blossomed with flowers in anticipation of the giving of the Torah on its summit. Greenery also figures in the story of the baby Moses being found among the bulrushes in a watertight cradle (Ex. 2:3) when he was three months old (Moses was born on 7 Adar and placed in the Nile River on 6 Sivan, the same day he later brought the Jewish nation to Mount Sinai to receive the Torah)[2].
For these reasons, Jewish families traditionally decorate their homes and synagogues with plants, flowers and leafy branches in honor of Shavuot. Some synagogues decorate the bimah with a canopy of flowers and plants so that it resembles a chuppah, as Shavuot is mystically referred to as the day the matchmaker (Moses) brought the bride (the Jewish people) to the chuppah (Mount Sinai) to marry the bridegroom (God); the ketubbah (marriage contract) was the Torah. Some Eastern Sephardi communities actually read out a ketubbah between God and Israel as part of the service.
All-night Torah study
According to the Midrash, the night before the Torah was given, the Jews went to sleep to be well-rested for the big day ahead. However, they failed to rise early, and Moses had to come to wake them up to meet God, Who was already waiting atop the mountain[3].
To rectify this flaw in the national character, religious Jews stay up all night to learn Torah. Any subject may be learned, although Talmud, Mishna and Torah typically top the list. In many communities, classes and lectures in the wee hours of the morning are offered for men and women. In Jerusalem, thousands of people finish off the nighttime study session by walking on foot to the Kotel before dawn and joining the sunrise minyan there. The latter activity is reminiscent of Shavuot's status as one of the three Biblical pilgrimage festivals, when the entire Jewish nation living in the land of Israel journeyed to Jerusalem to celebrate the holiday.
Tikkun Leil Shavuot
In keeping with the custom of engaging in all-night Torah study, the Arizal, a leading Kabbalist of the 16th century, arranged a special service for the evening of Shavuot. The Tikkun Leil Shavuot ("Rectification for Shavuot Night") consists of excerpts from the beginning and end of each of the 24 books of Tanakh (including the reading in full of several key sections such as the account of the days of Creation, The Exodus, the giving of the Ten Commandments and the Shema) and the 63 chapters of Mishnah. This is followed by the reading of Sefer Yetzirah, the 613 commandments as enumerated by Maimonides, and excerpts from the Zohar, with opening and concluding prayers. The whole reading is divided into thirteen parts, after each of which a Kaddish di-Rabbanan is recited when the Tikkun is studied in a group of at least ten Jews.
This service is printed in a special book, and is widely used in Eastern Sephardic and Hasidic communities. There are similar books for the vigils before the seventh day of Pesach and Hosha'ana Rabbah.
References
Kitov, Eliyahu (1978). The Book of Our Heritage, Vol. 3: Iyar-Elul. Jerusalem: Feldheim Publishers Ltd. ISBN 0-87306-154-3.
Scherman, Nosson ed. (1993). The Chumash. Brooklyn, NY: Mesorah Publications, Ltd. ISBN 0-89906-014-5.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shavuot
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Should I become Jewish or should I remain a gentile?
Greetings!
I found the articles on your website while looking for a Jewish understanding
of sin. The articles were well written and potentially useful in helping me
discern the answer to a question that has perplexed me (probably unnecessarily)
for years.
I was raised a Christian culture, but I've felt a spark of affinity with Jewish
thinking and ways of worship since my college days (over 20 years ago).
Over the years, I've developed an understanding of Jesus' teaching as
not really divergent from Jewish thinking. The corollary to that understanding
is the question, should I become Jewish or should I remain a gentile while
following a Jewish understanding of right behavior and right thinking?
Do you hear such a question often?
The answer I always seem to be led to is that one may become Jewish to join
the Jewish community for whatever reason, but one's path to salvation
can come through Jesus regardless of whether one chooses to join
the Jewish nation or not. For earnest seekers such as myself, the
mitzvot are appealing as a systematic path to greater righteousness,
especially if undertaken in the spirit of "Christian" charity. Also, since
my wife is Jewish, I have a personal reason to take the question seriously.
Do you have any resources, stories, or ideas to which you can direct people asking this question?
Mark
Austin, TX
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Shalom Mark!
Thank you for your question !!
Over the centuries people have taken different views. The early judaizers were adamant that gentiles HAD to become Jewish. So much so that the early church gathered to debate the issue. The norm was for Jewish people to believe in Jesus - gentiles were the exception. Today this has been reversed and many gentile Christians would prefer that Jewish believers forfeit their Jewishness. We find Acts 15 very instructive...
Acts 15:1 Some men came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the brothers: “Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved.” 2 This brought Paul and Barnabas into sharp dispute and debate with them. So Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with some other believers, to go up to Jerusalem to see the apostles and elders about this question. 3 The church sent them on their way, and as they traveled through Phoenicia and Samaria, they told how the Gentiles had been converted. This news made all the brothers very glad. 4 When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and elders, to whom they reported everything God had done through them.
Acts 15:5 Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, “The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses.”
Acts 15:6 The apostles and elders met to consider this question. 7 After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: “Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. 8 God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. 9 He made no distinction between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. 10 Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of the disciples a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear? 11 No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”
Acts 15:12 The whole assembly became silent as they listened to Barnabas and Paul telling about the miraculous signs and wonders God had done among the Gentiles through them. 13 When they finished, James spoke up: “Brothers, listen to me. 14 Simon has described to us how God at first showed his concern by taking from the Gentiles a people for himself. 15 The words of the prophets are in agreement with this, as it is written: 16 “‘After this I will return and rebuild David’s fallen tent. Its ruins I will rebuild, and I will restore it, 17 that the remnant of men may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who bear my name, says the Lord, who does these things’ 18 that have been known for ages.
Acts 15:19 “It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. 20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. 21 For Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.”
Acts 15:22 Then the apostles and elders, with the whole church, decided to choose some of their own men and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They chose Judas (called Barsabbas) and Silas, two men who were leaders among the brothers. 23 With them they sent the following letter: The apostles and elders, your brothers, To the Gentile believers in Antioch, Syria and Cilicia: Greetings.
Acts 15:24 We have heard that some went out from us without our authorization and disturbed you, troubling your minds by what they said. 25 So we all agreed to choose some men and send them to you with our dear friends Barnabas and Paul — 26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 27 Therefore we are sending Judas and Silas to confirm by word of mouth what we are writing. 28 It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: 29 You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.
Acts 15:15-19 seem to be the heart of the matter: Since Israel could not keep the law, why should a burden be placed upon gentiles who seek salvation by faith? God's standard of holiness for Israel was straight forward - we were to keep all the law - all the time. All the law was not just the 10 commandments as some say, but the 613 commandments given to Moses.
Lev. 11:44 For I am the LORD your God: ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and you shall be holy; for I am holy: neither shall you defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing that creeps upon the earth. 45 For I am the LORD that brought you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: you shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.
From a Jewish point of view there were two standards of holiness: 1) for Israel - the Jewish people, keeping all the 613 commandments, 2) for the gentiles to be righteous, they were to keep what are called the seven laws of Noah. With respect God's commandments, all of humanity is divided into two general classifications: the Children of Israel and the Children of Noah.
The Children of Israel are the Jews, the descendants of the Patriarch Jacob. They are commanded to fulfill the 613 commandments of the Torah.
The Children of Noah are the Gentiles, comprising the seventy nations of the world. They are commanded concerning the Seven Universal Laws, also known as the Seven Laws of the Children of Noah or the Seven Noahide Laws.
These Seven Universal Laws are:
Avodah Zarah: Prohibition on idolatry.
Birchat HaShem: Prohibition on blasphemy and cursing the Name of G-d.
Shefichat Damim: Prohibition on murder.
Gezel: Prohibition on robbery and theft.
Gilui Arayot: Prohibition on immorality and forbidden sexual relations.
Ever Min HaChay: Prohibition on removing and eating a limb from a live animal.
Dinim: Requirement to establish a justice system and courts of law to enforce the other 6 laws.
Men and women are equal in their responsibility to observe the Seven Universal Laws.
According to Jewish thought, when a Gentile resolves to fulfill the Seven Universal Laws, his or her soul is elevated. This person becomes one of the "Chasidei Umot Haolam" (Pious Ones of the Nations) and receives a share of the World to Come. The Torah calls one who accepts the yoke of fulfilling the Seven Universal Laws a "Ger Toshav" (a Proselyte of the Gate). [We who confess Jesus believe that ONLY through faith in HIM can one receive salvation!]
This person is permitted to live in the land of Israel and to enter to the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and to offer sacrifices to the G-d of Israel.
Those seven laws are grouped and reiterated in Acts 15:20 in the instructions to the gentiles. While gentiles do convert, the question for the believer in Jesus is this - of what gain is conversion/circumcision/coming under the law??
Many gentiles do attend messianic congregations and celebrate the Jewish roots of faith in Jesus. But they remain gentiles. This does not mean they are a second class citizen in the congregation or the kingdom, though in the past, some messianic leaders have erred by imposing dual citizenship as if one were better than the other.
The MYSTERY of the body of Christ is that now Jews AND gentiles come together as one body of believers. The walls of partition in the past are broken down. Co-equal standing exists not by physical birth, but by spiritual re-birth. Romans 10:11 For the scripture says, Whoever believes on him shall not be ashamed. 12 For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him.
In the end, it all boils down NOT to what we do, but to what God has done for us. For God so loved you, Mark, that he sent Jesus, so that if you believe in Him, you will have everlasting life.
What do you think of Jesus???
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Anti-Semitism is the hatred of the Jewish people.
The term was first used by a German in 1879, William Marr, who founded the "League for Anti-Semitism." Marr advanced the view that Jews constituted a distinct racial group which was both physically and morally inferior. According to Marr, there was indisputable scientific evidence that the Jews were predisposed to be a "slave race" while the "Aryans" which included the Teutonic and Nordic peoples, were the "Master Race."
Although the term "anti-Semitism" is thus relatively modern, documented prejudice, social and economic isolation, persecution and violence against the Jews predates Marr and his supporters by more than 2,300 years. In what is acknowledged to be the first historical reference to an anti-Semitic act, the Biblical account of the Purim story (the Book of Esther) recounts how the Jewish people narrowly escaped destruction in Persia in the 5th century B.C.E. All Jews in the kingdom were targeted for annihilation because one Jewish official refused to bow to the top aide of the king. Only as a result of the intervention of the queen, a Jew, who pleaded for saving her people, were the Jews saved from mass murder.
Classical anti-Semitism in the pre-Christian world followed along the same lines as the Purim story. For most of recorded history, the Jewish people had been the subjects of conquerors, such as the Persians, Greeks, Babylonians, Assyrians, and Romans. Most Jews refused to convert to the religion of their hosts and instead maintained their own religion, rituals and customs, often at great personal sacrifice.
The Jewish religion forbids Jews to bow down to any person or god other than the Creator. In the story of Purim, the failure of Mordecai, the Jewish, Persian official, to bow down to Haman, the top aide to the king, created conflict. This conflict between observing the Jewish religion and being sensitive to local customs was the basis for much of the anti-Semitism the Jewish people endured.
Examples are the following:
- Jews observed strict dietary laws. Thus they could not, according to their law, share a meal in their neighbors' homes.
- Jews also could not, according to their law, work on the seventh day. Christians observed Sunday as their Sabbath, and Moslems observed Friday as their Sabbath. As a result, Jews were often "out of step."
- People who observed minority religions were, for the most part, quite willing to make sacrifices to the gods of their host countries, even as they worshipped their own gods. With only few exceptions, Jews refused to do so.
- Also according to their law, Jews were not supposed to marry outside their faith, and most did not. Intergroup marriages often served as a bond in ancient times to promote intergroup harmony. This refusal also retarded any assimilation which would have narrowed the differences between the Jews and their host communities.
- Enlightened ancient political leaders often granted privileges and exemptions to Jews because of knowledge about their religious conflicts. Those who were not granted these privileges and exemptions often resented this special treatment.
- Jews maintained their traditional dress and continued to wear beards and earlocks even when styles changed among their hosts. The result was that Jews became more easily identified as a stereotyped culture which had ramifications beyond religious differences.
Evidence of anti-Semitism has been found in the writings of those who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, in the 4th century, B.C.E. In the first century C.E., Apion, a writer from Alexandria, wrote the "History of Egypt" which was the source for many of the false accusations about Jewish religious rituals which have plagued Jews throughout later history.
Isolated incidents of persecution against the Jews were recorded in the first century. As many as 4,000 Jews were deported to the island of Sardinia during the reign of the Roman Emperor Tiberius. The first recorded pogrom took place during the reign of the Roman Emperor Caligula in 38 C.E.
Classical Roman writers such as Cicero and Ovid wrote about the differences between Jewish observances and those of the Romans in less than flattering terms.
Christian(?) Anti-Semitism
Jesus of Nazareth was a Jew. His childhood was typical of young Jewish boys of his time. He was circumcised on the eighth day after his birth, received a religious education, learned a trade, kept the law of Moses, and spoke both Hebrew and Aramaic, the languages of the Jews of his day. Upon reaching the age of 30, he began to preach and teach about the kingdom of God, calling people to repentance, and ministering to the sick. Many people began to follow him. His inner circle of disciples, who after Jesus' death became the leaders of the first century church, were also Jews. For a number of years the early believers in Jesus as the Messiah were culturally and ethnically similar to, and even at times worshipping alongside, their mainstream counterparts. But a number of religious and political events in the latter half of the first century and the early part of the second began to drive a wedge between church and synagogue.
A record of one of the earliest conflicts is recorded in a book of the New Testament called The Acts of the Apostles, chapter 15. A question arose in the church whether Gentile (non-Jewish) believers in Jesus as the Messiah would be required to follow Jewish practices before being accepted as Christians. The church leaders ruled that they would not have to observe the entire Jewish law, only certain practices. As a result of the ruling on this issue, and the large-scale missionary efforts of the Apostle Paul to the Gentiles, the ethnic composition of the first century church began to rapidly change from a Jewish majority to a Gentile majority. To mainstream Jews, this change appeared as a willingness on the part of the early church to be a lawless society. They also feared this would allow pagan influences into the Jewish-Christian circles and eventually, Israel.
The destruction of the Second Temple (see "Who Are The Jews") contributed both to the growth of the early church and rabbinic Judaism. Demoralized after such a loss of Jewish national and religious life, people were grasping for something to believe in. Hope in a Messiah to save the people from the oppression of Rome began to grow. In 132 C.E., Simon Bar Kochba ("Son of the Star'), previously known as Simon Ben Cosiba, was endorsed by the leading Jewish intellectual of the time, Rabbi Akiba, to be the promised Messiah. Many people were skeptical, but the rabbis followed Akiba's precedent and hailed him as the Messiah. Bar Kochba led a revolt against Rome in 135 C.E. One segment of the population, however, refused to join in the revolt and wage war under the banner of Bar Kochba _ the Jews who had believed in Jesus as the Messiah. Bar Kochba killed a number of them, seeing them as enemies, heretics and traitors to the national cause.
Outraged at this, the growing Mediterranean church began to harbor bitterness against the Jewish people. The surviving Jewish believers in Jesus, who felt both a loyalty to Israel as well as to the Western church, were being alienated by both groups _ by the church because they were Jewish, and by Israel because of their obvious lack of support for Bar Kochba. As a result, two Messianic sects formed, the Ebionites and the Nazarenes, seeking to establish congregations which were more culturally Jewish. Embarrassed by the growing bitter anti-Semitism of the Western church, these sects disassociated themselves from the Western church in the second century. By 450 C.E., these groups had disappeared, and Christianity was becoming less and less tolerant of anything having to do with its Jewish roots. All things Jewish were suspect. The idea of a Jewish Christian maintaining a Jewish lifestyle became increasingly incomprehensible.
In the second century, theologians and church fathers became more concerned with "making the break" with anything Jewish, beginning to take an uncompromising posture of theological and political opposition. Blanket policies condemning Jews began to color New Testament interpretation. Some examples are:
- the promises of blessing to Israel in the Hebrew scriptures are now the exclusive property of the Church (Parkes, p. 98);
- God has cursed and rejected Israel, and now the Church is the "true" or "new" Israel; and
- the Jews killed Jesus; all Jews everywhere forever are responsible for his death.
Within the writings of the church fathers (called "patristic" writings) were three main types which proved to be damaging to Jewish-Christian relations not only at the time they were composed (and sometimes read aloud to Christian congregations) but also in centuries following, as they were often used as a justification for anti-Jewish sentiment and, in the case of John Chrysostom's virulent anti-Jewish sermons, even anti-Jewish legislation (Parkes, p. 71):
- Dialogue _ Served to propagate Christian teaching. One of the earliest (mid-second century) and most important sources is the Dialogue of the church father Justin Martyr with Trypho the Jew. In this dialogue, Trypho is portrayed as being very impressed by Justin Martyr's arguments and nearly coming to accept them.
- Testimony _ Collections of Old Testament texts the purpose of which was to prove different claims connected with the person of Christ and the call of the Gentiles. Served as a "handy compendium of arguments for possible controversies" with Jews (Parkes, p. 99). An example is that of the third century African church father, Cyprian, The Testimonies against the Jews.
- sermons or homilies _ A group of writings which was "especially directed against the Jews" (Parkes, 71). They served to warn Christians of the dangers of associating with the Jewish people and were developed as an absolute condemnation of the Jewish people, religion, and cultural practices. Example: Church Father John Chrysostom _ Adversus Judaeos, eight sermons preached at Antioch in 386-388 (Parkes, 119).
By the second century C.E., both Judaism and Christianity were trying to distinguish each from the other in the eyes of Rome, as both had unique political concerns. Judaism by then had attained legal status in the Roman world as a religion and did not want Christianity, with its loyalty to a King other than Caesar, to be associated with it. The church, now largely Gentile, also wanted to obtain legal status in the eyes of Rome so that it would not be identified with the Jews, who had rebelled against Rome under Bar Kochba. Once it was clear to Rome that Christianity was not a sect of Judaism, Christianity was regarded as an illegal sect and was no longer under the protective umbrella of the legal status of Judaism. With the establishment of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire by Constantine in the fourth century, however, Christianity soon began to enjoy a position of superiority over Judaism which caused serious consequences for Judaism. The new "Christian" empire began to enact such changes as:
- The removal of former religious and governing privileges
- The curtailment of Rabbinical jurisdiction
- Prohibition of missionary work
- Jews were no longer allowed to hold high offices or have military careers (e.g. legislation in 537 C.E. which prohibited local Jewish people from serving on municipal bodies).
Negative theological attitudes began to abound, such as the idea that Jews had lost their right to exist; Jews only exist as a testimony to the truth of Christianity; Jews are suffering justly at the hands of the Gentiles because God is angry with them, etc. Various church councils drew up damaging anti-Jewish legislation such as:
- banning contact with Jews
- the forbidding of the reading of the Torah exclusively in Hebrew (553 C.E.) (see Parkes, 251ff, 392).
- confiscation of Jewish property and the prohibition of the sale of Christian property to Jews (545 C.E.).
Subsequent writings by church fathers (and church leaders throughout church history) condemned Jews, accusing them of being idolaters, torturers, spiritually deaf, blasphemers, gluttons, adulterers, canibals, Christ-killers, and beyond God's forgiveness. Church Father John Chrysostom in particular pushed the idea of Jewish sensuality, gluttony, stubbornness and rejection by God.
With the rise of the Church-State, certain religio-political attitudes such as Jesus ruling the world through the Roman Christian government became evident in the Church. This attitude of superiority, flamed by the ever-increasing integration of the Church into Roman government, continued on into the Middle Ages and was translated into repeated actual restrictions on Jews, as is evidenced by the following examples.
The Justinian Code
The Justinian Code was an edict of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian (527-564). A section of the code negated civil rights for Jews. Once the code was enforced, Jews in the Empire could not build synagogues, read the Bible in Hebrew, gather in public places, celebrate Passover before Easter, or give evidence in a judicial case in which a Christian was a party. Decrees by the early Catholic Church (partial list)
- Synod of Elvira (306)_prohibited intermarriage and sexual intercourse between Christians and Jews, and prohibited them from eating together.
- Councils of Orleans (533-541)_prohibited marriages between Christians and Jews and forbade the conversion to Judaism by Christians.
- Trulanic Synod (692)_prohibited Christians from being treated by Jewish doctors.
- Synod of Narbonne (1050)_prohibited Christians from living in Jewish homes.
- Synod of Gerona (1078)_required Jews to pay taxes to support the Church.
- Third Lateran Council (1179)_prohibited certain medical care to be provided by Christians to Jews.
- Fourth Lateran Council (1215)_required Jews to wear special clothing to distinguish them from Christians.
- Council of Basel (1431-1443)_forbade Jews to attend universities, them from acting as agents in the conclusion of contracts between Christians, and required that they attend church sermons.
Crusades
The Catholic Church launched a series of nine holy wars from 1096-1272. The purpose of these wars was to march to the Holy Land of Palestine and liberate it from Moslem "infidels." Along the way, the crusaders massacred all "infidels" in their path who refused to be baptized on the spot to Christianity. Thousands of Jews were massacred in Germany and France.
Blood Libel and the Black Death
In the Middle Ages, Jews were accused of all kinds of slanders and were scapegoats for the problems of the day.
- Blood Libel _ In 1144, a myth began in England that Jews murdered Christian children. This myth was expanded to become an accusation which persisted for centuries that the Jews used the blood of Christian children in the preparation of their Passover unleavened bread (matzohs). This "blood libel" was ironic in that the consumption of any blood is expressly prohibited by Jewish law.
- Black Death_ the bubonic plague, the cause of the Black Death that liquidated a quarter of the population of Europe in the 14th century, was blamed on the Jews in Europe and Asia. The Pope issued a bull declaring that Jews were not responsible for the plague, but not before many Jews were burned alive or hanged by enraged mobs.
During this period, Jews were permitted to be moneylenders and act as financiers, only because this activity, while necessary for a prosperous economy, was viewed by the Church as sinful. Because Jews enjoyed a monopoly over an activity viewed as sinful, a Jewish stereotype was perpetuated.
The only real answer to anti-Semitism is to reject it out of hand, renounce it everywhere, and respond vigorously when it appears. The true enemy is not a people or a group, but Satan who seeks the very destruction of the Jewish people that God's plans and purposes might be thwarted.
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April 5, 2007 - If wine has leaven, why is it OK for Passover?
First, what makes something kosher for Passover is not that it hasn't risen, but that it hasn't been made from a grain that was wet for more than 18 minutes (so say the rabbis!).
The five prohibited biblical grains are wheat, barley, oats, rye, and spelt; Ashnkenazim added fences around the Torah to include corn, rice, beans, etc., and with those even oils and starches and other derivatives, as well as yeast itself. Aging and rising is fine; grains rising from long exposure to water is not. (Cheese and yogurt are OK; non-grain souffles are fine; much alcohol is thus also kosher for passover, including wines and most liquours, though beer and grain alcohols are not). As always, these are the traditional categories; we each follow them in the ways we see fit.
As for year-round kashrut of wines, it's actually counter-intuitive, and even offensive to many. For other foodstuffs, kashrut means avoiding contamination by forbidden ingredients, which is often a good thing. For wines, on the other hand, "kosher" means "uncontaminated by gentiles!" It made sense eons ago, in an era of blood libels and highly specified ritual uses for certain wines, to keep Jewish and gentile production processes apart. Today, some see no extra value in wine being "kosher," and arguably find an ethical value in avoiding it.
With few exceptions, neither pork (year-round) nor bread (Pesach) finds its way into a nice merlot or cabernet—so whatever looks good is fair game, in many people's estimation. With all that said, there's plenty of Golan & Gamla & Baron Herzog & other decent, affordable bottles of kosher-but-way-better-than-Manischewitz wine out there. And remember to always serve a non-alcoholic grape juice option as well.
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The following outline explains the basics of the very intricate set of laws that govern kosher food. Proper implementation of these rules is achieved only by close consultation with a kosher expert.
The laws of kosher food originate in the Bible, and have been observed by Jews for over 3,300 years. There are three categories of kosher food - meat, dairy, and parve.
1. Meat - For an animal to be kosher, it must have split hooves and it must chew its cud. (Examples: cow, goat, lamb.) Non-kosher animals include pig, camel, and rabbit. Fowl such as chicken, turkey, certain duck, and certain goose are kosher. Animals and fowl must be slaughtered by a specialist (a shochet) and then soaked and salted to remove the blood. All carnivorous (meat-eating) animals and fowl, and the blood of all animals and fowl, and any derivatives or products thereof, are not kosher.
2. Dairy - Milk and milk products (cheese, cream, butter, etc.) of a kosher animal are kosher and dairy. These may not be eaten in combination with meat or fowl.
3. Parve - Foods that contain neither meat nor dairy ingredients are termed "parve," which indicates a neutral state. All fruits, grains, and vegetables in their natural state are kosher and parve. Fish that have fins and scales are kosher and parve. Some examples are salmon, flounder, and halibut. Examples of non-kosher fish are shark, sturgeon, catfish, and swordfish. All reptiles, shellfish, and underwater mammals, and most insects, are not kosher. A parve item can become dairy when it is cooked together with a dairy food; it becomes meat when cooked with meat. (Example: vegetables produced together with meat may not be eaten with dairy and are no longer parve.)
MEAT AND DAIRY SEPARATION
The requirement to separate meat and dairy products applies not only to food, but also to the utensils used for storing, preparing, and serving these foods. Therefore, completely separate sets of pots, dishes, cutlery, etc., are standard in a kosher kitchen. There is a waiting period after eating meat before eating dairy, six hours in most communities. The waiting period also applies to foods that have been cooked with meat. A similar waiting period applies after eating hard cheese before eating meat. It should be noted that although fish is neither meat nor dairy, fish and meat may be eaten together. Kosher food produced on machinery previously used for non-kosher food may be rendered non-kosher.
KOSHERIZING
The process of making vessels, utensils, dishes, ovens, and sinks kosher is called kashering, or kosherizing. It is sometimes possible to make non-kosher equipment kosher. This is done under the watchful eye of a rabbi who is versed in the procedure, the nature of which will vary depending on the kind of equipment that is involved.
PASSOVER
Passover, the eight-day holiday that commemorates the Exodus of the Jewish people from bondage in Egypt to freedom and nationhood, involves a unique set of kosher laws. No leavened products may be consumed on Passover. Certain grain products and their derivatives, although kosher the rest of the year, may not be consumed during Passover. In addition, in many communities, legumes are not permitted on Passover. The equipment used for production of Kosher for Passover items must also be Kosher for Passover.
WINE
A special rule governs the production of wine. Even if all the ingredients in wine are of kosher origin, it is kosher only if production was done exclusively by Torah-observant Jews. The making of kosher wine can involve a significant investment of time and expense, with equipment being kosherized from previous production runs and a trained team of Torah-observant Jews stepping in to supervise the production of the kosher wine.
WHAT DOES "THE CHOSEN PEOPLE" MEAN TODAY?
Alan,
A teacher at our day school just stopped by my office and asked the question,
“Is there any official LCMS document that states that the Jews are not God’s
exclusively chosen people?” He’s been speaking with a member who believes that
the Jews are still as a nation/race God’s chosen people. Can you help me out?
I didn’t see anything on your web site so I thought I’d email you. Thanks for
whatever you have to offer.
Peace,
Pastor Scott Malme (Pilgrim Lutheran Church, Green Bay, WI)
PASTOR MALME,
When I read what you sent, I hear several questions: What does it mean to be
God's chosen people? What does it mean for those who are not chosen? Has God's
'choice' changed (broadened) over time? Are there 'official' LCMS documents on
these issues?
God chose Israel to "be a blessing" to "all peoples on earth". The Israelites
were to be a light to the Gentiles. Paul explains that the Jewish people were
"entrusted with the very words of God" (Romans 3), received the law, worshipped
in the Temple, served as prophets and were the human ancestors of Christ (Romans
9). But salvation has always come by faith alone. Being a descendant of Israel
was never enough, by itself, to give saving faith.
God's promises to his people are eternal and unchanging. Nothing has happened to
cause the Jewish people to cease being God's chosen people (and thus still called to be a light tot he lost gentiles), as this term was
used in the Hebrew Scriptures. What has changed is the long awaited Jewish
Messiah has come! We now know more about the mystery that God wants all people,
both Jew and Gentile, to be saved, through faith in Jesus. He has chosen from
among all people, Jew and Gentile, his elect, for salvation. Election is a very
different choosing and a very difficult subject! - ALAN BUTTERWORTH
A WRITER NAMED MARSHALL ASKS:
During my lunch with two evangelical friends, the subject of
missionaries came up. They, like me, abhor missionaries "to the Jews"
Alan Butterworth responds: I would be curious to hear about the basis for their faith. Could you put me in touch with them?
I apologize for my lengthy reply. You raise a lot of important issues:
1. Evangelical Christiains should abhor missions to the Jews.
Do you know where the word "evangelical" comes from? The Greek word in the New Covenant that it comes from means "Good News." Did Jesus teach that the Good News was about interfaith dialog with the Pharisees? Or Abhorring missionaries to the Jewish people, like Shimon (Peter)? Not exactly.
In the New Covenant the word evangelical refers to the specifc Good News that Jesus taught and fulfilled: that He came to suffer and die for the sins of all people, Jewish and Gentile.
If what we believe is true, why would we not want to share? If it is true, wouldn't withholding the truth about how to receive the free gift of eternal life be the greatest form of anti-Semitism?
Are you familiar with Michael Medved? He too is an Orthodox Jewish man. He too has many evangelical friends. He has no problem with their belief that Jesus is the only way to heaven. He understands that the desire of a Christian to see all people, Jewish and Gentile, receive the gift of eternal life thru faith in Jesus is not something he should fear. While he does not share their faith, he believes that the response of Jewish people to Christians who share their faith should not be fear, or to attack them or insist that they change their faith. He believes the answer is for Jewish people to learn more about Judaism. He also understands that Christians and Jewish people are allies in the war against those who believe in killing those who refuse to believe the same things they do.
The counter missionaries, like Yad L'achim, see the issue in eternal terms. They say believing in Jesus destroys a Jewish soul. Do you agree? If you agree, but you believe there is no afterlife, what exactly is the consequence of losing one's soul?
I don't understand the irrational fear that a Jewish soul is destroyed when a person confesses Faith in Jesus. How could that be? That is some powerful mojo! It is not what the Scriptures teach.
While it may be true that the third our fourth generation of a Jewish family that turns from Orthodox Judaism may not know they are Jewish, does this mean they have lost their soul?
and we discussed why missionaries are so insensitive and crass. One of
the answers he gave, and with which I completely agree, is that it's a
matter of perception. Missionaries cannot conceive of the fact that
while to them the cross is a symbol of love, faith and godliness, to the
Jew it is a symbol of murder, evil, paganism, persecution and
(figuratively) Satan. To the Jew, Jesus is a demi-god, not even on the
plane of Satan, but a figment that is the cause of 2,000 years of suffering.
2. Christians are Insensitive and Crass; Christians Caused 2,000 years of Jewish suffering.
People have all kinds of beliefs. Anyone can choose to take offense to anything. Does a bad experience justify condemning an entire group? Isn't that the way prejudice starts?
Belief in Jesus is not the same as being an apologist for what people have done in His name. The church has done horrible things to Jewish people and others throughout history. But is it fair to evaluate Christianity based on the worst things in history that have been done by people calling themselves Christians? Shouldn't Christianity be evaluated based on what it teaches?
The Scriptures say that before someone comes to faith, the message we preach is foolishness and an offense. They teach that it is only God that can help you understand.
I like to use the example of a group of men in San Francisco a few years ago who claimed that AIDs was a conspiracy of straight people and that AIDs did not exist. They couldn't stand what they were hearing about the disease and its cause and course and that they needed all kinds of medicine. So because the message was so offensive (I'm sure they thought it was crass), they stopped taking their medicine. What happened? They died.
Isn't the real question who defines crass? Which is more important: who may or may not be offended by what, or whether there is an absolute standard? To the Christian, the test for how we should act, the test for right and wrong, is the Scriptures. If you don't believe the standard should be the Scriptures, should what is crass be subject to a popular vote?
Can we agree that everyone should be free to believe whatever they want to believe as long as they do not do not harm others? I believe you have the right to reject what I believe and it is not right for anyone to force anyone else to believe anything.
Yeshua certainly did not force anyone to believe in Him. Even as he gave his life, he asked HaShem to forgive his killers because they didn't know what they were doing. He was clear: He did not come to be some kind of political leader or to condemn anyone. He came to save all people. From what? Sin!
Long before Yeshua, Daniel prophesied in the 12th chapter of his writings that a time of judgment was coming that would be horrible. He said some would be delivered, people whose names are written in the Book (of Life). Then: "Multitudes will rise from the dust of the earth: some to a place of everlasting life, and others to a place of shame and everlasting contempt."
Yom Kippur, Leviticus 16, is all about atonement for sin. It was the only sacrifice for ALL of the sin of the people. It was the only sacrifice for unconfessed sin.
Aren't cards still exchanged to wish that another's name may be inscribed in the Book of Life for a good year? What is the basis today for getting your name in the Book of Life today? Without a Temple, there can be no sacrifice (even as many practice schlugging kapporah), so how is sin atoned for? Why in the Siddur do the prayers ask HaShem to restore the Temple so the sacrifices may begin again? Why haven't these prayers been answered?
What happened to the prophecy in Haggai 2 that there would be greater peace in the second Temple than in the first? What about the prophecy in Daniel 9 that Messiah would come and atone for sin before the second Temple would be destroyed? Why does the Talmud say that during the last 40 years of the Temple (from about the year 30) that the sacrifices on Yom Kippur were not accepted by HaShem anymore?
Why was there so much clarity in the Scriptures about the reasons for the destruction of the first Temple, and even the length of the captivity, but no similar explanation about reasons for and the length of time the second Temple would remain destroyed?
Did the God who created the world suddenly abandon his Word? Is there anything in the Scriptures that supports the idea that we are now in a new age where we are now the judges of right and wrong?
3. To a Jewish Person, Christian Symbols are Symbols of Evil.
Belief that Yeshua is the Messiah is based on the Scriptures, not the symbols one may have. Is it not true that in any faith one may find a range of how many symbols the followers use?
I have friends who are Jewish believers in Jesus who refuse to set foot in churches because of what they perceive is idolatry: not because they worship the Messiah is divine, part of the triune God, but because they have graven images.
There are many believers in Yeshua who do not call themselves Christian because they are Jewish believers, and find the words Jesus and Christ to be 'loaded' with anti-Semitic history. Like many in the New Covenant Scriptures, they continue to be circumcised and to celebrate Jewish holidays based on the Scriptures. While they would like to believe that Jewish symbols may be more attractive to Jewish people, does this make the message that Yeshua is the Messiah, the once for all atonement for sin, less offensive?
On the other hand, if you believe they are no longer Jewish because they believe the Messiah has come, then doesn't it follow that either Rabbi Schneerson is the Messiah, or that his followers are also no longer Jewish?
4. Christians and the Holocaust.
Everyone needs to understand the holocaust. There is no defense of what happened. Survivors need our unconditional love. And God wants us to learn from what happened so it never happens again.
I have made contact with several holocaust museums. One of the purposes of holocaust museums is not being served by the current exhibits. There should be an exhibit about the role of people calling themselves Christians. And there should be an examination of the Scriptural or "Orthodox" Christian basis for the anti-Semitic actions of these people ... to reveal clearly that NONE of the anti-Semitism, the hatred, the violence, the persecution, the murders ... none of it is consistent with Christianity or the Scriptures. It cannot be called anything other than what it is ... sin.
Until we understand that Christianity may not be based on anything other than the Scriptures, we risk a repeat of the holocaust. The biggest problem in the German church today is that there has not been a full examination of the church's role in the holocaust. So many records are still sealed. Those who were involved have not repented and received God's forgiveness. Too many have chosen a very sad route: they have turned away from the Scriptures, ashamed of what Jesus taught because of what men have done.
What is taught by many today is not Orthodox Christianity, not a Christianity based on the Scriptures, and not a Christianity that teaches the self sacrifice that Jesus taught ... nor to love one's enemies. These teachings are superhuman. But our faith is not based on what we do, or earn, it is based solely on receiving the gift of faith in what God has already done. That is hard to accept ... it requires truly letting go of all reliance on one's own efforts and trusting God as revealed in his Word!
I believe the only way the church in Europe, and those who were involved in the holocaust, can truly learn and go forward is to fully examine what happened, repent and receive God's forgiveness. If the holocaust happened because people got AWAY from the Scriptures, what sense does it make for people in the church to respond to the holocaust by getting away from the Scriptures now?
There has to be more to Christianity than the gspels that were passed
down by the Catholic church and, my evangelical friends agree that
Christians will not fulfill their destiny until they understand that
Christianity is not an extension of Judaism but rather an expression of
the Jewish concept of God. Saul of Tarsus intended it as "Judaism for
Pagans", not as a primary religion.
I don't know what this means. Perhaps your friends would like to contact me?
All the lessons of the New Testament
are contained in the Hebrew Scriptures and teachings. Nothing in the New
Testament is new and nothing in the so-called Old Testament is old.
I agree. When Jesus talked about the Scriptures, the only ones that existed were the Hebrew Scriptures! These Scriptures said much about Yeshua and what he would do.
If you want an example, take a look at Isaiah 53. But I must warn you. If you read Isaiah 53, you might realize it was God's plan all along that Yeshua would suffer and die for our sin and rise from the dead.
It's
time for Christians to accept the laws of Noah and disabuse themselves
of such evil concepts as salvation solely through avowed belief.
5. Salvation Solely Through Avowed Belief is Not Biblical
Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me." The exclusive claims of Jesus are difficult. But by what standard do you believe this teaching is evil? Do you have a reference in the Hebrew Scriptures? At Genesis 15:6, Abraham trusted HaShem and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Was there any other god in whom men could place their faith and be declared righteous?
Christianity must accept the fact that there are no rewards for serving
God save for the satisfaction of serving Him. God does not want you to
have a Cadillac. God does not point a finger and "zot", your prayers are
answered.
Agreed!! The question is not whether there are rewards. The Scriptures teach we can't earn anything. The question is if God loves us and wants us to be with him and to serve him forever, as the Scriptures say, what happens if we turn our back on Him and His Book of Life? What does the Jewish prophet Daniel say will happen if our name is not in the Book of Life?
Name it and claim it teachers have as much impact on Christianity as the rabbis who went to Tehran to support the little Iranian who denies the holocaust have on Judaism.
I can't speak for God but I sincerely believe that serving Him is its
own reward. This is a Chassidic concept and I think it is true.
I don't disagree. The question is how do we know if we are serving God? What is your authority? If it is how a person feels or thinks, is this not this subject to more abuse than a faith based on writings that God Himself claims to have given us?
You can challenge me on my faith based on whether my faith is consistent with the Scriptures. We are called to challenge our teachers based on the Scriptures ... as opposed to following them as they criticize the Scriptures. If the Scriptures are not the basis of your faith, or just some passages at some times, are you ready for whatever consequences follow from being the judge of whether a teaching in the Scriptures or somewhere else is true?
Serving
God for possible rewards in this life or in some fantasy afterlife is
fraught with danger. That is what has made Christianity and Islam so
hazardous and why Judaism has survived despite the slings and arrows
cast by its wannabe imitators.
,\\
Marshall, I care about you. During the holocaust, true Christians cared about Jewish neighbors, as the Scriptures taught. I have a Gentile neighbor who was a young boy living outside the camp at Treblinka. His family understood their faith to mean they had to hide Jewish people and they did. His brother was a teacher and the Nazis hated what he taught so he was put in a camp. This is what Christianity teaches ... to love your enemy.
Even as we disagree about many things, I still hope we will be able to get together in June for a beer!
Shalom!
Alan Butterworth
Missionary,
Is Christianity anti-Semitic?
I've been exposed to Anne Coulter's opinion and as far as I am concerned, she is exercising her required duty as a Christian. I don't happen to like that duty but I understand her motivation. So as far as I am concerned, she can spout the words which only confirm the evil of her religion but I only hope that no Jews succumb to missionizing. - M.
I am sorry that you believe that Christianity is evil. I don't know if I have told you before, but I really appreciate your willingness to share with me so openly. I know I have, and will continue to, learn a lot from you.
The horrible things Christians have done is a different issue than the basis for our faith (the Scriptures) and what we believe. May I explain?
Christianity is based on the Scriptures. When someone claiming to be a Christian does not act according to the Scriptures, that person's biggest problem is between him and God. The church also has a responsibility to confront such behavior (see Matthew 18).
When it comes to the past, I would love to work with you to expose what has happened so everyone can learn. There is no excuse what was done.
But when people who claim to follow a faith act stupidly, or contrary to the teachings of the faith, does that change the nature of the faith? When King David committed adultery and murder, did that change who God is or what the Bible teaches? When Jewish Rabbis go to a conference in Iran with Ahmadinijad to deny the holocaust, does this change Judaism or the validity of Judaism? Or does this say more about these rabbis than about Judaism?
There is no rational human being who can disagree with you that people calling themselves Christians have done horrible things to Jewish people, even in the name of Jesus. This is a horrible tragedy, indefensible and should not be forgotten! I believe we should add a section to holocaust museums about this stuff... I actually propose this regularly to the museums and Rabbis... I suppose it is a bit of a hot potato... how will people learn if Christians don't face our history?
I believe that in Europe, the holocaust was never faced by the church or its people. The result is a twisted form of Christianity that no longer sees sharing the Gospel as its duty. To get there, because they did not want to face the truth and repent, they had to abandon chunks of the Scriptures and change their faith.
The real problem is we have NOT shown the light of day to ALL of the records after the war. I am certain the story is worse that many in the church want to believe... but I believe it is critical to get this out in the open for two reasons... those who committed the attrocties (individuals and organizations) need to repent, make appropriate changes and seek God's forgiveness, and everyone else needs to learn from what happened so this will never happen again.
I am optomistic about the future of the true church (people who do hold to the Scriptures) when it comes to NOT repeating the attrocities of the holocaust, etc. Why? After the Passion movie, Abe Foxman and many others were surprised there was not more anti-semitic incidents. I believe the reason for this is that more Christians are reading the Bible! There is a correlation. The "German Church" during the holocaust had to get rid of almost the entire Bible because they could not accept the truth: that Jesus was Jewish!
The question for me is always the same. What is the authority for your beliefs? The anti-Semite comes to the Bible with presuppositions and proceeds to remove from the Bible whatever differs from his preconceptions. Does this mean you should do the same?
When I encounter a Christian who says we should not share the Gospel with Jewish people, I ask them for the authority for their belief. It is NEVER based on the Bible.
The Scriptures do not teach anything anti-Semitic unless you believe that a Jewish person confessing faith in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah is bad. Logically, how could this be worse than a Jewish person confessing faith as a pagan (Buddhist, Hindu, etc), or as an atheist, or that someone else (like Schneerson) is the Messiah?
I do not agree that a Jewish person who confesses faith in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah loses their identity as a Jewish person. (My understanding of Orthodox Judaism is that such a person is an apostate, but is still Jewish and can 'repent' before they die). I know many Jewish people who have become much more Jewish after coming to believe that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah.
Some tell me I want to destroy Jewish souls. This comes from a misunderstanding. Christian baptism comes from Judaism... it is really cleansing in the mikveh. The concept of baptism is the same: purifying someone in the name of God through the Promise in His Word.
If I was to convert to Judaism, as you keep talking about, I would, at the end of the process, go into a mikveh, and come up out of the waters... Jewish. Many Jewish people believe that when a Jewish person confesses faith in Jesus, and gets baptized, he or she comes up out of the waters of baptism... Christian AND Gentile (ie. no longer Jewish). I have never seen anything in the Scriptures that supports the idea that believing in Jesus destroys Jewish identity.
In fact, the opposite is true. The early followers of Jesus believed you had to be circumcised (ie Jewish) to believe in Jesus (see Acts 10-11). After all, he was the Jewish Messiah. God showed Peter that Jesus was not only the Jewish Messiah, but also for the Gentiles! Peter did not stop being Jewish nor did many other followers of Jesus. They worshipped in the Temple, were Torah observant, celebrated the Jewish holidays, and permitted Gentiles to worship and believe in Jesus by keeping only the Noachide laws (Acts 15).
I admit that a great deal of anti-Semitism worked its way into the church. You will get no argument from me on this. But we (thru our partner ministry, the Caspari Center) are engaged in scholarship to get the truth out about how influential Jewish believers in Jesus were for centuries. And yet, when the pogroms started, even in Alexandria, Jewish believers in Jesus were not exempt from the disease that is anti-Semitism.
I am committed to helping open up this history and get the church to face what happened. I believe you and I agree about how horrible that was (and still is in some places, like Russia and Germany). For me, anti-Semitism is all the worse when it is done in the name of the church. That is heresy and an abomination!
If you separate the historic anti-semitism of the church from the Scriptures for a moment (since it is NOT supported AT ALL by the Scriptures) and just consider whether you can be Jewish and believe in Jesus based on the Scriptures, I would like to understand your thoughts on just this question.
Shalom!
Alan Butterworth
Missionary,
What do Jewish people believe about the Lineage of the Messiah?
Here are Alan Butterworth's thoughts on what Jewish people believe today about the lineage of
Messiah (Christ):
There is no single Jewish response to a question like this. The opinions are
varied. Most Jewish people today are not looking for the Messiah to come. Many
are atheist (we have an atheist or humanist synagogue near us in Sarasota), or
agnostic, many more do not believe that the Hebrew Scriptures (what we call the
Old Testament) is the inspired Word of God... so most Jewish people are not
looking for anything special or at best, for a Messianic Age, not a Messiah.
It is, for the most part, only the Orthodox and some Conservative Jewish people
who are waiting for the Messiah. And even among these groups, there are large
numbers of Jewish people who believe that the Messiah came and died (or
disappeared)in 1994, and they are waiting for him to rise from the dead (or
return). There may be a big news story soon as factions of this group have been
fighting about whether Rabbi Schneerson is actually dead or not. There is a
lawsuit working thru the Courts in NY about a sign that referred to him in
Hebrew terms equivalent to the English phrase “of blessed memory.”. It was torn
down by those who believe he is not dead... It is interesting that this group,
known as Chabad, continues to grow worldwide, as they wait for the Rebbe to
return.
So that leaves a relatively small number of Jewish people who are truly waiting
for the Messiah. When I talk to such people, I ask "How will we know when he
comes?" We asked this question as we went door to door in a Houston Orthodox
neighborhood... the answers vary, but rarely would such a person be swayed by
genealogy. For almost all of these people, there is an authority they follow
called the Talmud, which they claim is inspired, known as the Oral tradition at
the time of Jesus, that teaches no matter what, Jesus is not the Messiah.
There is a tiny group of Jewish people, called Kararites, mostly in Israel, who
are waiting for the Messiah and do not believe the Talmud is authoritative...
they would be the most open to proof of fulfillment of Biblical Messianic
prophesy. As you might expect, they have not yet been convinced that Jesus
fulfills the prophesies, including the genealogy. They are quite knowledgeable
in the Bible, and it is quite challenging to interact with them.
If you compare the genealogies in Matthew and Luke, you will see some
significant differences. If you compare either to the Hebrew Scriptures, you
will see yet other problems... much has been written to try and resolve these
differences, but counter-missionaries and knowledgeable Jewish people may raise
these problems. If you are not prepared, they may cause you to wonder or doubt.
But like any other objection to the Messiahship of Jesus that is outside of your
knoweldge, there is something you can do... ask the person this question: "If I
answer your objection, or question, to your satisfaction, will you consider
whether Jesus is the Messiah?" If they say no, you have reached the end of that
day's conversation about Jesus. If they say yes, then you can approach your
pastor and others for the resources to provide to your friend so that you may
share the truth with as much detail as is necessary.
Many people are seeking the perfect Scripture or approach to win Jewish people
to the Gospel. Before putting our hope in these things, we need to remember
that this is a spiritual battle. The Bible says that Jewish people's hearts are
hard so that we, the Gentiles, can come to faith in the Messiah. There is a
spiritual element of this hardness that has been a part of God's plan since Deut
32:15-21. Paul talks about it at Romans 11:25, suggesting that at the end, this
hardness will not exist any more, and after the full number of Gentiles has come
in, Jewish people will be able to respond to the Gospel.
I say this not to discourage you from praying for or sharing with a Jewish
person. After all, Romans 11:25 says the hardness is only in part. There
always have been and always will be a faithful remnant of Jewish believers.
I often think of myself as a spiritual geologist, seeing all different sizes and
shapes of hardened hearts. When a person has a hard heart, they can't
understand the truth. But the Gospel is powerful! Our job is to share, pray
and ask the Holy Spirit to draw them to faith!
Lord willing, the Jewish person you are praying for will receive the gift of
eternal life before it is too late!
Do the Jewish people believe in the same God as Christians?
A few years ago, I [Steve Cohen] attended the installation of Rev. Robert Roegner to the position of Director of World Missions for the Lutheran Church- Missouri Synod. Bob and I have a lot in common in that we are members of the same church, Jan and I nearly purchased his home when we moved to St. Louis, both of our youngest children will be in the same confirmation class, we both like to eat and we share a passion for reaching the lost with the Gospel. He is also one of the members of the Board of Directors for The Apple of His Eye.
The dynamic and highly animated guest preacher that morning was Rev. Dr. Paul K. Flynn, President of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Ghana. He exudes a passion for reaching the lost. He spoke on the text from Phillipians 2:1-11 reminding the standing-room only filled chapel that our positions of service are one of humility – but sometimes our positions could trap us as we project a Superiority Syndrome. We in the church are better than they… and fill in the blank. Or we who are in leadership position are better than… fill in that blank.
Sometimes that syndrome presents itself sporting the cloak of good works or presenting right doctrine…. Left me shift gears and see if I can illustrate...
A deeply troubling issue surfaced in the wake of the September 11th attacks. Many Christians are seeking information about the Muslims and Jewish people and their beliefs. Seeking information is indeed a good and proper pursuit and we all can learn more. However, I heard a radio host on the talk show Issues, etc. ask this question of his guest, a Jewish Lutheran pastor: Is the God the Jewish people worship the true God? The response given to and accepted without challenge by the host: No! Because the Jewish people do not accept the trinity, they therefore do not worship the true God.
Well, on the surface, one might think… hmmm, this seems to make sense. I readily admit that I am not an in-depth master of philosophical or theological reasoning. However there is an obvious flaw in the response given: This definition of who is the true God is deduced NOT in the nature of God… but in the responsiveness of the Jewish people.
A review of Romans chapters 9-11 will help move the discussion along. Perhaps you may want to stop at this point and read with a critical eye those chapters and then continue with my article.
God reveals himself in the Old Testament as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the true and living God: God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you. ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers — the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob — has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation. Exodus 3:14-15
Paul pauses in his discourse with the intent of urging his gentile audience to have compassion for and bring the Gospel to Israel (the Jewish people): Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. Romans 10:1.
Paul clearly proclaims that salvation for ANY person, is NOT by any work, but by the grace and mercy of God through faith: What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the “stumbling stone.” As it is written: “See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” Romans 9:30-33
Unbelieving Israel is on a path to destruction because they have sought to establish their relationship with God by works of the law, not through faith. For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes. Moses describes in this way the righteousness that is by the law: “The man who does these things will live by them.” Romans 10: 2-5
How then is anyone saved? The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame. For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile — the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” Romans 10:8-13
So the issue of who God is can never be defined by whether one receives Christ or not… God is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). Salvation is clearly at stake and only found through faith in Y’shua. Jews and gentiles who believe are saved, Jews and gentiles who do not believe are not.
Paul continues: Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ. But I ask: Did they not hear? Of course they did: “Their voice has gone out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.” Again I ask: Did Israel not understand? First, Moses says, “I will make you envious by those who are not a nation; I will make you angry by a nation that has no understanding.” Romans 10:17-19
The Gospel was first brought to the Lost Sheep of Israel. The first followers of Jesus were Jewish, the disciples were Jewish, the authors of the whole Bible with the possible exception of Luke were Jewish. In fact, the debate raged in Acts 15 about whether gentiles should first become Jewish in order to follow their Messiah. The Holy Spirit made it clear that they did not. But as gentiles grew in numbers in response to the Gospel brought to them by the Jewish people, they in turn have an important responsibility… to provoke Israel to jealousy because of their faith.
What then? What Israel sought so earnestly it did not obtain, but the elect did. The others were hardened, as it is written: “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes so that they could not see and ears so that they could not hear, to this very day.” And David says: “May their table become a snare and a trap, a stumbling block and a retribution for them. May their eyes be darkened so they cannot see, and their backs be bent forever.” Again I ask: Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all! Rather, because of their transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious.
But if their transgression means riches for the world, and their loss means riches for the Gentiles, how much greater riches will their fullness bring! I am talking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I make much of my ministry in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them. For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead? If the part of the dough offered as firstfruits is holy, then the whole batch is holy; if the root is holy, so are the branches.
If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, do not boast over those branches. If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.” Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but be afraid. For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either. Romans 11:7-21
As a missionary, this is one of the deep spiritual mysteries I contend with… God has chosen to blind Israel in part. This means that some will respond in faith and have from the days of Jesus to this very day. But WHY did God harden their hearts? In order that salvation would be extended to the gentiles.
To claim that the Jewish people do not worship the true God reflects clearly a superiority syndrome… we have it right and the Jews have it wrong. Yet Paul issues a stern warning: do not boast but be afraid for the gentiles could be “not spared” too.
Rev. Dave Born, the Chairman of our Board of Directors puts it this way, As to the God of Israel to whom Jews pray, I believe He is the True Father God. Because there is not faith in Jesus, however, the gospel relationship with this Father is not possible beyond a relationship of law which is neither salvific nor satisfying. For those who seek the truth and pray to the Father outside of Jesus' name, I believe would be included among those of whom Jesus proclaimed "not FAR from the Kingdom”.
Since it was God who hardened of the heart, how then can any Christian today claim that the Jews do not worship the true God? There is only ONE God… While unbelieving Israel faces eternal damnation because of sin, that was true even before the incarnation and resurrection of Jesus. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God!
Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree! I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. Romans 11:22-25
Paul makes it clear, God is able to graft unbelieving Jewish people them back in again. How can this be done? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. This means for the obedient Christian, in love and with prayer, we take the initiative to bring a hearing of the Word of God to the Jewish people. This must be done intentionally and with a sense of urgency for once death takes place there is no second chance.
The superiority syndrome leads people to make claims and boast of their faith and thus in doing so end up in putting down others who lack faith. Paul called for humility recognizing that we all are sinners saved by grace through faith. As such, I believe we should not erect unnecessary barriers! We must all enable a clear hearing of the Gospel and do what we can to demonstrate God’s love with genuine compassion and concern.
Jesus said, “ I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me.” John 14:6. Those words were first spoken to my people. God said it and that settles it. So let’s tell others before it is too late. Enough with the quibbling already!
Is it LEGAL to do evangelism in Israel?
We regularly receive calls and correspondence that people know for a fact that it is against the law to witness in Israel. People who have gone on tours have been told ahead of time that they should not bring any literature to distribute so that there would not be any illegal activities. This is just plain wrong.
The answer is YES. You can share your faith openly and publicly.
Well, we wanted to set the record straight, and not from our mouths, but from a very reliable source in the land of Israel – Haaretz Newspaper….
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=421251&contrassID=2&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y
Continuation of Do unto your neighbor
Conditional tolerance
Very few people in Arad are standing by the Messianic Jews. "Expel them from here immediately," demands Udi Asher, a kiosk owner in the town's large commercial center. The center is empty on this blazing hot afternoon, and Asher seems to be waiting for an opportunity to get mad. "Some woman came here, bought nuts and gave me a New Testament. I wanted to throw her out of the store. I restrained myself, but I didn't understand what she was after. She knows I'm Jewish, so why did she try to convert me? If they're allowed to do that, then so are the Haredim. It's a war of survival. We have to preserve a Jewish character in the town. I still have a limitation in my brain: I don't want to live next to a Christian or next to a Muslim."
Arad has a population of 26,000, with an unemployment rate of 9.6 percent (as compared with the national average of 10.9 percent). Some 40 percent of the residents are new immigrants, mainly from the former Soviet Union. There is a large Haredi population - 300 families of the Gur hasidic sect, 50 or so Chabad families, and another 50 families that support the ultra-Orthodox Shas Sephardi party. In the past few years Arad has changed from a town that traditionally supported Labor to a bastion of the right. In the 1996 elections, Labor won 30 percent of the vote, Likud 22.9 percent, and in 1999, Ehud Barak, Labor's candidate for prime minister, received 64 percent of the vote, nearly 30 percent more than the Likud candidate, Benjamin Netanyahu (35.9 percent). The turnabout occurred in 2001: Ariel Sharon won 58.7 percent of the vote, Barak only 41.2 percent. In 2003, the Likud took about 62 percent of the vote, as against only 21.3 percent for Labor.
Labor also sustained a defeat in the municipal elections last November, when Dr. Motti Bril, an independent candidate who is considered to have a right-wing orientation, defeated Labor's Bezalel Tabib, who was mayor for 15 years. The Messianic Jews settled in Arad during Tabib's tenure. "I never felt their presence," the former mayor says. "I heard about them when someone came to me three years ago and said that they were here and were holding meetings in someone's house. It wasn't a complaint. He said they were very nice. It's true that they talk about the Christian cause, but they are also happy and they sing and talk about love. Every person has the right to do what he wants in his home. It didn't bother me."
The new mayor takes a different approach to the subject. "They are not being persecuted. In what way are they persecuted?" Bril asks. "They come to the place and operate on the fringe of the law that bans missionary activity. We treat them politely and with due courtesy, but they are far from being complete tzadikim [saintly people]. There is a group of Haredim that says they already broke the law when they distributed food to Holocaust survivors ahead of Pesach and placed a copy of the New Testament and some money in the package."
They deny that.
"In the meantime I am not taking action and not doing anything against them. I don't have enough evidence to act against them, so I am not taking any active steps. On the day they cross the line the municipality of Arad will use all its might to expel them. If I had something that is absolute proof, they wouldn't be in Arad. Because I don't, I am tolerant. In the meantime, they are on the borderline but they are far from being persecuted saints. We're on the threshold of a struggle. A group arrives that tries to do something else, and they are allowed to proceed up to a certain limit, but only up to a certain limit. This is a very tolerant city, but missionary activity is against the law. As long as we're in the gray area, we're not bothering with them."
So, to maintain the municipal coalition you prefer to ignore the harassment of the Messianic Jews?
"People are allowed to hold a demonstration next to private homes. It's not pleasant, not conventional, not ordinary, but it's allowed. And it has nothing to do with the municipal coalition. There are people who think that what they are doing is bad and they are demonstrating next to their homes. What's wrong with that?"
Yitzhak Benishti, a Labor Party representative on the municipal council, also objects to the presence of the Messianic Jews. "I'm against all this messianic organizing, I'm not in favor and I don't support them. These are Jews who are engaged in missionary activity."
That's a rumor being spread by the Haredim, but there's no proof of it, is there?
"That's why I say that if they are engaging in missionary activity, I am against. I am not intervening in the matter."
If there's no proof of missionary activity, why shouldn't you intervene to protect them?
"The truth is that I am against holding demonstrations across from private homes and bothering the neighbors. All the neighbors are already very upset."
And what about the Messianic Jews - they are also very upset, aren't they?
"I just haven't been in Arad for the past two weeks. I will consider intervening in their favor. I will definitely consider it."
What the law says
Sergei Bikhovsky, a representative of the centrist, anticlerical party Shinui on the municipal council, and the party's top official in the south, says he is torn between the law - "For me the law is the most important thing, and the law says that missionary activity is forbidden" - and the people themselves, "who are very nice and have even opened a chess club for immigrants from the former Soviet Union. I'm in a really bad spot."
But aren't they in an even worse spot?
"The action taken by the Haredim is not right. The way they reacted isn't so nice."
Gabi Bahan, who was a representative of the liberal Meretz party on the previous municipal council (Meretz does not have a representative on the current council), objects to the Haredi demonstrations. "The rabbis here are conducting illegitimate politics by taking advantage of the Messianic Jews," he says. "It's very easy for a large group to exploit a minority group to crystallize itself. The Messianic Jews live their lives and don't make themselves felt. The question is who the missionary is here. The Gur hasidic sect built a school for secular children to get them to become religious. The town should be pluralistic. The greater the diversity, the stronger we will be as a community."
Nevertheless, Bahan has so far done nothing to protect the Messianic Jews. Maybe he'll write an article for the local weekly, he says. Eitan Michaeli, a resident of Arad and the deputy director of the Be'er Sheva branch of Shatil - which defines itself as "a capacity-building center for grassroots social change organizations" - was also a Meretz representative on the last council. And he has already written an article for the local paper. "It's hard to do more than that," he says. "Arad has become a place where it's very difficult to mobilize people. In the past, people here voted for Mapai [forerunner of Labor], Dash [the defunct Democratic Movement for Change, a centrist party] and for Meretz, but in the past few years the Likud and Shas have become stronger. It's a pity that the rabbis don't understand that they are playing with a double-edged sword. Just as they are now inciting against the Messianic Jews, tomorrow people will incite against them. They are fanning the flames and in the end they will be burned."
The head of the local Likud branch, Moshe Edri, says that he has read the law - "and I hope the mayor will act according to the law and thus resolve the problem."
Won't the problem be resolved if the Haredim are prevented from harassing the Messianic Jews?
"I don't see that anyone is harassing them. I would suggest that there be no missionary activity in any city in this country."
Three sections of the Penal Code deal with missionary activity.
According to Par. 174(A), anyone "who gives or promises a person money, the equivalent value of money or any other material benefit in order to entice him to change his religion or so that he will entice someone else to change his religion, shall be imprisoned for five years or pay a fine of 50,000 [Israel] pounds." Par. 174(B) states that anyone who receives material benefits in order to convert is liable to a prison term of three years and a fine of 300,000 pounds. And Par. 368 stipulates that anyone who conducts a conversion ceremony for someone who is under-aged is liable to six months in prison.
In December 2001, the Knesset's Constitution, Law and Justice Committee voted down a bill by MK Moshe Gafni (United Torah Judaism), which would have imposed a three-month prison term on anyone who tried to cajole someone to convert by means of the mail or by fax. "I have a small boy at home, who could receive missionary material by mail, by fax or by e-mail," Gafni told the committee. "I'd be interested to know why you receive this kind of thing but I don't," wondered MK Ophir Pines-Paz (Labor). "I have spoken about this to the director of the postal service many times, and piles of this material arrive," Gafni said.
In recent years the Knesset has held only a few discussions on the subject of missionary activity. In one of the most exhaustive discussions, held by the Interior Committee in November 1999, Inspector Yosef Cohen, an officer with the police Investigations Branch, warned against militant persecution of the Christian sects in Israel. "The U.S. administration itself closely monitors the law-enforcement authorities in Israel in regard to persecution of what it calls religious sects, as the messianic sects in the United States have a very powerful lobby in the administration," Cohen said. "Therefore, as with any other law, the law-enforcement authorities in Israel should be especially careful and adopt an attitude that is completely legal, no less and no more."
Cohen also cited some interesting statistics. During the 1990s, he said, the police received between 10 and 20 complaints concerning offenses relating to religious conversion. However, the members of the messianic sects, he said, had submitted no fewer than 60 complaints against Yad L'Achim. "I would expect organizations engaged in guarding the Jewish public against Christian preaching not to resort to violent activity," he noted.
Constant fear
H., a lawyer, is very fearful of the Haredi activity in Arad. She is a 41-year-old single mother with three children. She refuses to divulge any details that might disclose her identity, but agreed to meet with me at the Arad shopping mall. She doesn't meet with strangers in her home, she explained, so that they won't find out where she lives. Her children try not to say anything about her religious beliefs to their friends, so as to spare her harassment.
She became a Messianic Jew two years ago, she says. "For many years I searched for God," she says. "In the course of the search I also became close to the Haredim. A few years ago I even became a regular donor to a Haredi radio station, and I wore long skirts, went to the mikveh [ritual bath] and read three chapters of Psalms every day."
One of her neighbors in Herzliya, where she lived, was a Messianic Jew. "She read me chapters from the Bible. It scared me, but I was also attracted to it. It responded to a lot of things that were bothering me." H. told hardly anyone about her new faith. "My mother knows. We have long arguments. She is a Holocaust survivor. My father doesn't know to this day. The father of my three children became very frightened. He was certain that harm would befall the children. He calmed down only after seeing that nothing happened to the children. My brother learned about it only recently."
Relatives who know about her belief sometimes harass her no less than the Haredim. "My son went to visit someone in the family who knows. My son was wearing a crown that he received from a fast-food restaurant. The crown had illustrations of crosses on it. The relative was so frightened that he cut out the crosses."
Her faith is a private matter, she says. "How can I be a missionary if I hardly talk about the subject with anyone? A friend expressed interest, and I gave him a book to read. He returned the book and said he's not interested in these subjects and that was the end of the conversation. In the past few months I took a course given by the Labor Ministry, and no one there knew I am a Messianic Jew. As far as I'm concerned, it's a private spiritual process. If I don't share it with even those who are closest to me, why would I share it with others?"
For the past few weeks she has been gripped by fear. "It was a bad surprise for me to find out that there are religious wars in Arad. It sounds absurd. It's a small, quiet, lovely town. When I was a girl we spent summer vacations here, and when my mother retired she dreamed of coming back here - which is why I came to Arad a year ago. Who believed it would happen here? We know that we can expect more persecution. We will accept it the way Gandhi did in India, with passive resistance. We will not leave this place. We believe we are doing a good thing for Arad. I pray that there will be an economic boom in Arad. I remember better days here. When I was a girl, there was the Masada Hotel, today it's a heap of rubble. In the winter I prayed for rain in Arad.
To secular eyes, you very much resemble the Haredim.
"That's true. There's a saying that we met our enemies and they are us. The sharpest clashes are with those who are like you."
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What is Shavout?
Shavuot, sometimes pronounced Shavuos (Hebrew: שבועות; Israeli Heb. [ʃa·vu·'ʕot]; Ashkenazi [ʃə·'vu·əs]; "[Feast of] Weeks"), is a Jewish holiday that occurs on the sixth day of the Hebrew month of Sivan, corresponding to late May or early June. It marks the conclusion of the Counting of the Omer and the day the Torah was given at Mount Sinai. It is one of the shalosh regalim, the three Biblical pilgrimage festivals mandated by the Torah.
Unlike the other two pilgrimage festivals, Passover and Sukkot, the date of Shavuot is not explicitly mentioned in the Torah. Rather, its occurrence is directly linked to the date of Passover. The Torah mandates the seven-week Counting of the Omer, beginning on the second day of Passover and culminating on the 50th day, Shavuot. This counting of days and weeks expresses anticipation and desire for the Giving of the Torah. At Passover, the Jewish people were freed from being slaves to Pharaoh; at Shavuot they accepted the Torah and became a nation committed to serving God.
Shavuot has many aspects and as a consequence is called by several names. In the Torah it is called Feast of Weeks (Hebrew: חג השבועות, Hag ha-Shavuot, Exodus 34:22, Deuteronomy 16:10); Festival of Reaping (Hebrew: חג הקציר, Hag ha-Katsir, Ex. 23:16), and Day of the First Fruits (Hebrew יום הבכורים, Yom ha-Bikkurim, Numbers 28:26). The Mishnah and Talmud refer to Shavuot as Atzeret (Hebrew: עצרת, a solemn assembly), as it provides closure for the festival activities during and following the holiday of Passover. Since Shavuot occurs 50 days after Passover, Christians gave it the name Pentecost (πεντηκόστη, "fiftieth [day]"). However, the actual Christian commemoration of Pentecost occurs on the seventh Sunday after Easter.
In the Land of Israel and among Reform and Karaite Jews, Shavuot is celebrated for one day. In the Jewish diaspora outside Israel, the holiday is celebrated for two days, on the sixth and seventh days of Sivan.
Connection with the harvest
Besides its significance as the day on which the Torah was given by God to the Jewish nation at Mount Sinai, Shavuot is also connected to the season of the grain harvest in Israel. In ancient times, the grain harvest lasted seven weeks and was a season of gladness (Jer. 5:24; Deut. 16:9-11; Isa. 9:2). It began with the harvesting of the barley during Passover and ended with the harvesting of the wheat at Shavuot. Shavuot was thus the concluding festival of the grain harvest, just as the eighth day of Sukkot (Tabernacles) was the concluding festival of the fruit harvest. During the existence of the Temple in Jerusalem, an offering of two loaves of bread from the wheat harvest was made on Shavuot (Lev. 23:15-21).
Ceremony of Bikkurim
Shavuot was also the first day on which individuals could bring the Bikkurim (first fruits) to the Temple in Jerusalem (Mishnah Bikkurim 1:3). The Bikkurim were brought from the Seven Species for which the Land of Israel is praised: wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates (Deut. 8:8). In the largely agrarian society of ancient Israel, Jewish farmers would tie a ribbon around the first ripening fruits from each of these species in their fields. At the time of harvest, the fruits identified by the ribbon would be cut and placed into baskets woven of gold and silver. The baskets would then be placed on oxen whose horns were gilded and laced with garlands of flowers, and who were led in a grand procession to Jerusalem. As the farmer and his entourage passed through cities and towns, they would be accompanied by music and parades.
At the Temple, each farmer would present his Bikkurim to a kohen in a ceremony that followed the text of Deut. 26:1-10. This text begins by stating, "An Aramean tried to destroy my father," referring to Laban's efforts to weaken Jacob and rob him of his progeny (Rashi on Deut. 26:5)—or by an alternate translation, the text states "My father was a wandering Aramean," referring to the fact that Jacob was a penniless wanderer in the land of Aram for 20 years (ibid., Abraham ibn Ezra). The text proceeds to retell the history of the Jewish people as they went into exile in Egypt and were enslaved and oppressed; following which God redeemed them and brought them to the land of Israel. The ceremony of Bikkurim conveys the Jew's gratitude to God both for the first fruits of the field and for His guidance throughout Jewish history (Scherman, p. 1068).
Modern observances
Shavuot is unlike other Jewish holidays in that it has no prescribed mitzvot (Torah commandments) other than the traditional festival observances of abstention from work, special prayer services and holiday meals. However, it is characterized by many minhagim (customs) that have taken on the force of law in traditional Jewish circles. A mnemonic for these customs is the letters of the Hebrew word acharit (אחרית, "last"). Since the Torah is called reishit (ראשית, "first"), the customs of Shavuot highlight the importance of custom for the continuation and preservation of Jewish religious observance.
These customs, largely observed in Ashkenazic communities, are:
אקדמות – Akdamut, the reading of a liturgical poem during Shavuot morning synagogue services
חלב – Chalav (milk), the consumption of dairy products like milk and cheese
רות – Ruth, the reading of the Book of Ruth at morning services
ירק – Yerek, the decoration of homes and synagogues with greenery
תורה – Torah, engaging in all-night Torah study.
Akdamut
This liturgical poem extolling the greatness of God, the Torah and Israel is read publicly in the synagogue right before the morning reading of the Torah on the first day of Shavuot. It was composed by Rabbi Meir of Worms, whose son was murdered during the Crusade of 1096. Rabbi Meir was forced to defend the Torah and his Jewish faith in a debate with local priests, and successfully conveyed his certainty of God's power, His love for the Jewish people, and the excellence of Torah. Afterwards he wrote Akdamut, a 90-line poem in Aramaic which stresses these themes. The poem is written in a double acrostic pattern according to the order of the Hebrew alphabet. In addition, each line ends with the syllable "ta" (תא), the last and first letters of the Hebrew alphabet, alluding to the endlessness of Torah. The traditional melody which accompanies this poem also conveys a sense of grandeur and triumph.
Sephardim do not read akdamut, but before the evening service they sing a poem called Azharot which sets out the 613 Biblical commandments. The positive commandments are recited on the first day and the negative commandments on the second day.
Dairy foods
All types of sweetened dairy foods, such as cheese-filled blintzes (shown frying in pan) and cheesecakes are usually served on Shavuot. Dairy foods such as cheesecake and cheese-filled blintzes are traditionally served on Shavuot. One explanation for the consumption of dairy foods on this holiday is that the Israelites had not yet received the Torah, with its laws of shechita (ritual slaughtering of animals). As the food they had prepared beforehand was not in accordance with these laws, they opted to eat simple dairy meals to honor the holiday. Some say it harks back to King Solomon's portrayal of the Torah as "honey and milk are under your tongue" (Song of Songs 4:11). [1].
Book of Ruth
Each of the five books of the Tanakh known as Megillot (Hebrew: מגילות, "scrolls") is publicly read in the synagogue on a different Jewish holiday. The Book of Lamentations, which details the destruction of the Holy Temple, is the reading for Tisha B'Av; the Book of Ecclesiastes, which touches on the ephemeralness of life, corresponds to Sukkot; the Book of Esther (Megillat Esther) retells the events of Purim; and the Song of Songs, which echoes the themes of springtime and God's love for the Jewish people, is the reading for Passover.
The Book of Ruth (מגילת רות, Megillat Ruth) corresponds to the holiday of Shavuot both in its descriptions of the barley and wheat harvest seasons and Ruth's desire to become a member of the Jewish people, who are defined by their acceptance of the Torah. Moreover, the lineage described at the end of the Book lists King David as Ruth's great-grandson. According to tradition, David was born and died on Shavuot (Sha'arei Teshuvah to Orach Hayyim, 494).
Greenery
According to the Midrash, Mount Sinai suddenly blossomed with flowers in anticipation of the giving of the Torah on its summit. Greenery also figures in the story of the baby Moses being found among the bulrushes in a watertight cradle (Ex. 2:3) when he was three months old (Moses was born on 7 Adar and placed in the Nile River on 6 Sivan, the same day he later brought the Jewish nation to Mount Sinai to receive the Torah)[2].
For these reasons, Jewish families traditionally decorate their homes and synagogues with plants, flowers and leafy branches in honor of Shavuot. Some synagogues decorate the bimah with a canopy of flowers and plants so that it resembles a chuppah, as Shavuot is mystically referred to as the day the matchmaker (Moses) brought the bride (the Jewish people) to the chuppah (Mount Sinai) to marry the bridegroom (God); the ketubbah (marriage contract) was the Torah. Some Eastern Sephardi communities actually read out a ketubbah between God and Israel as part of the service.
All-night Torah study
According to the Midrash, the night before the Torah was given, the Jews went to sleep to be well-rested for the big day ahead. However, they failed to rise early, and Moses had to come to wake them up to meet God, Who was already waiting atop the mountain[3].
To rectify this flaw in the national character, religious Jews stay up all night to learn Torah. Any subject may be learned, although Talmud, Mishna and Torah typically top the list. In many communities, classes and lectures in the wee hours of the morning are offered for men and women. In Jerusalem, thousands of people finish off the nighttime study session by walking on foot to the Kotel before dawn and joining the sunrise minyan there. The latter activity is reminiscent of Shavuot's status as one of the three Biblical pilgrimage festivals, when the entire Jewish nation living in the land of Israel journeyed to Jerusalem to celebrate the holiday.
Tikkun Leil Shavuot
In keeping with the custom of engaging in all-night Torah study, the Arizal, a leading Kabbalist of the 16th century, arranged a special service for the evening of Shavuot. The Tikkun Leil Shavuot ("Rectification for Shavuot Night") consists of excerpts from the beginning and end of each of the 24 books of Tanakh (including the reading in full of several key sections such as the account of the days of Creation, The Exodus, the giving of the Ten Commandments and the Shema) and the 63 chapters of Mishnah. This is followed by the reading of Sefer Yetzirah, the 613 commandments as enumerated by Maimonides, and excerpts from the Zohar, with opening and concluding prayers. The whole reading is divided into thirteen parts, after each of which a Kaddish di-Rabbanan is recited when the Tikkun is studied in a group of at least ten Jews.
This service is printed in a special book, and is widely used in Eastern Sephardic and Hasidic communities. There are similar books for the vigils before the seventh day of Pesach and Hosha'ana Rabbah.
References
Kitov, Eliyahu (1978). The Book of Our Heritage, Vol. 3: Iyar-Elul. Jerusalem: Feldheim Publishers Ltd. ISBN 0-87306-154-3.
Scherman, Nosson ed. (1993). The Chumash. Brooklyn, NY: Mesorah Publications, Ltd. ISBN 0-89906-014-5.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shavuot
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Should I become Jewish or should I remain a gentile?
Greetings!
I found the articles on your website while looking for a Jewish understanding
of sin. The articles were well written and potentially useful in helping me
discern the answer to a question that has perplexed me (probably unnecessarily)
for years.
I was raised a Christian culture, but I've felt a spark of affinity with Jewish
thinking and ways of worship since my college days (over 20 years ago).
Over the years, I've developed an understanding of Jesus' teaching as
not really divergent from Jewish thinking. The corollary to that understanding
is the question, should I become Jewish or should I remain a gentile while
following a Jewish understanding of right behavior and right thinking?
Do you hear such a question often?
The answer I always seem to be led to is that one may become Jewish to join
the Jewish community for whatever reason, but one's path to salvation
can come through Jesus regardless of whether one chooses to join
the Jewish nation or not. For earnest seekers such as myself, the
mitzvot are appealing as a systematic path to greater righteousness,
especially if undertaken in the spirit of "Christian" charity. Also, since
my wife is Jewish, I have a personal reason to take the question seriously.
Do you have any resources, stories, or ideas to which you can direct people asking this question?
Mark
Austin, TX
------
Shalom Mark!
Thank you for your question !!
Over the centuries people have taken different views. The early judaizers were adamant that gentiles HAD to become Jewish. So much so that the early church gathered to debate the issue. The norm was for Jewish people to believe in Jesus - gentiles were the exception. Today this has been reversed and many gentile Christians would prefer that Jewish believers forfeit their Jewishness. We find Acts 15 very instructive...
Acts 15:1 Some men came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the brothers: “Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved.” 2 This brought Paul and Barnabas into sharp dispute and debate with them. So Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with some other believers, to go up to Jerusalem to see the apostles and elders about this question. 3 The church sent them on their way, and as they traveled through Phoenicia and Samaria, they told how the Gentiles had been converted. This news made all the brothers very glad. 4 When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and elders, to whom they reported everything God had done through them.
Acts 15:5 Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, “The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses.”
Acts 15:6 The apostles and elders met to consider this question. 7 After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: “Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. 8 God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. 9 He made no distinction between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. 10 Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of the disciples a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear? 11 No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”
Acts 15:12 The whole assembly became silent as they listened to Barnabas and Paul telling about the miraculous signs and wonders God had done among the Gentiles through them. 13 When they finished, James spoke up: “Brothers, listen to me. 14 Simon has described to us how God at first showed his concern by taking from the Gentiles a people for himself. 15 The words of the prophets are in agreement with this, as it is written: 16 “‘After this I will return and rebuild David’s fallen tent. Its ruins I will rebuild, and I will restore it, 17 that the remnant of men may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who bear my name, says the Lord, who does these things’ 18 that have been known for ages.
Acts 15:19 “It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. 20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. 21 For Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.”
Acts 15:22 Then the apostles and elders, with the whole church, decided to choose some of their own men and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They chose Judas (called Barsabbas) and Silas, two men who were leaders among the brothers. 23 With them they sent the following letter: The apostles and elders, your brothers, To the Gentile believers in Antioch, Syria and Cilicia: Greetings.
Acts 15:24 We have heard that some went out from us without our authorization and disturbed you, troubling your minds by what they said. 25 So we all agreed to choose some men and send them to you with our dear friends Barnabas and Paul — 26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 27 Therefore we are sending Judas and Silas to confirm by word of mouth what we are writing. 28 It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: 29 You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.
Acts 15:15-19 seem to be the heart of the matter: Since Israel could not keep the law, why should a burden be placed upon gentiles who seek salvation by faith? God's standard of holiness for Israel was straight forward - we were to keep all the law - all the time. All the law was not just the 10 commandments as some say, but the 613 commandments given to Moses.
Lev. 11:44 For I am the LORD your God: ye shall therefore sanctify yourselves, and you shall be holy; for I am holy: neither shall you defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing that creeps upon the earth. 45 For I am the LORD that brought you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: you shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.
From a Jewish point of view there were two standards of holiness: 1) for Israel - the Jewish people, keeping all the 613 commandments, 2) for the gentiles to be righteous, they were to keep what are called the seven laws of Noah. With respect God's commandments, all of humanity is divided into two general classifications: the Children of Israel and the Children of Noah.
The Children of Israel are the Jews, the descendants of the Patriarch Jacob. They are commanded to fulfill the 613 commandments of the Torah.
The Children of Noah are the Gentiles, comprising the seventy nations of the world. They are commanded concerning the Seven Universal Laws, also known as the Seven Laws of the Children of Noah or the Seven Noahide Laws.
These Seven Universal Laws are:
Avodah Zarah: Prohibition on idolatry.
Birchat HaShem: Prohibition on blasphemy and cursing the Name of G-d.
Shefichat Damim: Prohibition on murder.
Gezel: Prohibition on robbery and theft.
Gilui Arayot: Prohibition on immorality and forbidden sexual relations.
Ever Min HaChay: Prohibition on removing and eating a limb from a live animal.
Dinim: Requirement to establish a justice system and courts of law to enforce the other 6 laws.
Men and women are equal in their responsibility to observe the Seven Universal Laws.
According to Jewish thought, when a Gentile resolves to fulfill the Seven Universal Laws, his or her soul is elevated. This person becomes one of the "Chasidei Umot Haolam" (Pious Ones of the Nations) and receives a share of the World to Come. The Torah calls one who accepts the yoke of fulfilling the Seven Universal Laws a "Ger Toshav" (a Proselyte of the Gate). [We who confess Jesus believe that ONLY through faith in HIM can one receive salvation!]
This person is permitted to live in the land of Israel and to enter to the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and to offer sacrifices to the G-d of Israel.
Those seven laws are grouped and reiterated in Acts 15:20 in the instructions to the gentiles. While gentiles do convert, the question for the believer in Jesus is this - of what gain is conversion/circumcision/coming under the law??
Many gentiles do attend messianic congregations and celebrate the Jewish roots of faith in Jesus. But they remain gentiles. This does not mean they are a second class citizen in the congregation or the kingdom, though in the past, some messianic leaders have erred by imposing dual citizenship as if one were better than the other.
The MYSTERY of the body of Christ is that now Jews AND gentiles come together as one body of believers. The walls of partition in the past are broken down. Co-equal standing exists not by physical birth, but by spiritual re-birth. Romans 10:11 For the scripture says, Whoever believes on him shall not be ashamed. 12 For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him.
In the end, it all boils down NOT to what we do, but to what God has done for us. For God so loved you, Mark, that he sent Jesus, so that if you believe in Him, you will have everlasting life.
What do you think of Jesus???
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Anti-Semitism is the hatred of the Jewish people.
The term was first used by a German in 1879, William Marr, who founded the "League for Anti-Semitism." Marr advanced the view that Jews constituted a distinct racial group which was both physically and morally inferior. According to Marr, there was indisputable scientific evidence that the Jews were predisposed to be a "slave race" while the "Aryans" which included the Teutonic and Nordic peoples, were the "Master Race."
Although the term "anti-Semitism" is thus relatively modern, documented prejudice, social and economic isolation, persecution and violence against the Jews predates Marr and his supporters by more than 2,300 years. In what is acknowledged to be the first historical reference to an anti-Semitic act, the Biblical account of the Purim story (the Book of Esther) recounts how the Jewish people narrowly escaped destruction in Persia in the 5th century B.C.E. All Jews in the kingdom were targeted for annihilation because one Jewish official refused to bow to the top aide of the king. Only as a result of the intervention of the queen, a Jew, who pleaded for saving her people, were the Jews saved from mass murder.
Classical anti-Semitism in the pre-Christian world followed along the same lines as the Purim story. For most of recorded history, the Jewish people had been the subjects of conquerors, such as the Persians, Greeks, Babylonians, Assyrians, and Romans. Most Jews refused to convert to the religion of their hosts and instead maintained their own religion, rituals and customs, often at great personal sacrifice.
The Jewish religion forbids Jews to bow down to any person or god other than the Creator. In the story of Purim, the failure of Mordecai, the Jewish, Persian official, to bow down to Haman, the top aide to the king, created conflict. This conflict between observing the Jewish religion and being sensitive to local customs was the basis for much of the anti-Semitism the Jewish people endured.
Examples are the following:
- Jews observed strict dietary laws. Thus they could not, according to their law, share a meal in their neighbors' homes.
- Jews also could not, according to their law, work on the seventh day. Christians observed Sunday as their Sabbath, and Moslems observed Friday as their Sabbath. As a result, Jews were often "out of step."
- People who observed minority religions were, for the most part, quite willing to make sacrifices to the gods of their host countries, even as they worshipped their own gods. With only few exceptions, Jews refused to do so.
- Also according to their law, Jews were not supposed to marry outside their faith, and most did not. Intergroup marriages often served as a bond in ancient times to promote intergroup harmony. This refusal also retarded any assimilation which would have narrowed the differences between the Jews and their host communities.
- Enlightened ancient political leaders often granted privileges and exemptions to Jews because of knowledge about their religious conflicts. Those who were not granted these privileges and exemptions often resented this special treatment.
- Jews maintained their traditional dress and continued to wear beards and earlocks even when styles changed among their hosts. The result was that Jews became more easily identified as a stereotyped culture which had ramifications beyond religious differences.
Evidence of anti-Semitism has been found in the writings of those who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, in the 4th century, B.C.E. In the first century C.E., Apion, a writer from Alexandria, wrote the "History of Egypt" which was the source for many of the false accusations about Jewish religious rituals which have plagued Jews throughout later history.
Isolated incidents of persecution against the Jews were recorded in the first century. As many as 4,000 Jews were deported to the island of Sardinia during the reign of the Roman Emperor Tiberius. The first recorded pogrom took place during the reign of the Roman Emperor Caligula in 38 C.E.
Classical Roman writers such as Cicero and Ovid wrote about the differences between Jewish observances and those of the Romans in less than flattering terms.
Christian(?) Anti-Semitism
Jesus of Nazareth was a Jew. His childhood was typical of young Jewish boys of his time. He was circumcised on the eighth day after his birth, received a religious education, learned a trade, kept the law of Moses, and spoke both Hebrew and Aramaic, the languages of the Jews of his day. Upon reaching the age of 30, he began to preach and teach about the kingdom of God, calling people to repentance, and ministering to the sick. Many people began to follow him. His inner circle of disciples, who after Jesus' death became the leaders of the first century church, were also Jews. For a number of years the early believers in Jesus as the Messiah were culturally and ethnically similar to, and even at times worshipping alongside, their mainstream counterparts. But a number of religious and political events in the latter half of the first century and the early part of the second began to drive a wedge between church and synagogue.
A record of one of the earliest conflicts is recorded in a book of the New Testament called The Acts of the Apostles, chapter 15. A question arose in the church whether Gentile (non-Jewish) believers in Jesus as the Messiah would be required to follow Jewish practices before being accepted as Christians. The church leaders ruled that they would not have to observe the entire Jewish law, only certain practices. As a result of the ruling on this issue, and the large-scale missionary efforts of the Apostle Paul to the Gentiles, the ethnic composition of the first century church began to rapidly change from a Jewish majority to a Gentile majority. To mainstream Jews, this change appeared as a willingness on the part of the early church to be a lawless society. They also feared this would allow pagan influences into the Jewish-Christian circles and eventually, Israel.
The destruction of the Second Temple (see "Who Are The Jews") contributed both to the growth of the early church and rabbinic Judaism. Demoralized after such a loss of Jewish national and religious life, people were grasping for something to believe in. Hope in a Messiah to save the people from the oppression of Rome began to grow. In 132 C.E., Simon Bar Kochba ("Son of the Star'), previously known as Simon Ben Cosiba, was endorsed by the leading Jewish intellectual of the time, Rabbi Akiba, to be the promised Messiah. Many people were skeptical, but the rabbis followed Akiba's precedent and hailed him as the Messiah. Bar Kochba led a revolt against Rome in 135 C.E. One segment of the population, however, refused to join in the revolt and wage war under the banner of Bar Kochba _ the Jews who had believed in Jesus as the Messiah. Bar Kochba killed a number of them, seeing them as enemies, heretics and traitors to the national cause.
Outraged at this, the growing Mediterranean church began to harbor bitterness against the Jewish people. The surviving Jewish believers in Jesus, who felt both a loyalty to Israel as well as to the Western church, were being alienated by both groups _ by the church because they were Jewish, and by Israel because of their obvious lack of support for Bar Kochba. As a result, two Messianic sects formed, the Ebionites and the Nazarenes, seeking to establish congregations which were more culturally Jewish. Embarrassed by the growing bitter anti-Semitism of the Western church, these sects disassociated themselves from the Western church in the second century. By 450 C.E., these groups had disappeared, and Christianity was becoming less and less tolerant of anything having to do with its Jewish roots. All things Jewish were suspect. The idea of a Jewish Christian maintaining a Jewish lifestyle became increasingly incomprehensible.
In the second century, theologians and church fathers became more concerned with "making the break" with anything Jewish, beginning to take an uncompromising posture of theological and political opposition. Blanket policies condemning Jews began to color New Testament interpretation. Some examples are:
- the promises of blessing to Israel in the Hebrew scriptures are now the exclusive property of the Church (Parkes, p. 98);
- God has cursed and rejected Israel, and now the Church is the "true" or "new" Israel; and
- the Jews killed Jesus; all Jews everywhere forever are responsible for his death.
Within the writings of the church fathers (called "patristic" writings) were three main types which proved to be damaging to Jewish-Christian relations not only at the time they were composed (and sometimes read aloud to Christian congregations) but also in centuries following, as they were often used as a justification for anti-Jewish sentiment and, in the case of John Chrysostom's virulent anti-Jewish sermons, even anti-Jewish legislation (Parkes, p. 71):
- Dialogue _ Served to propagate Christian teaching. One of the earliest (mid-second century) and most important sources is the Dialogue of the church father Justin Martyr with Trypho the Jew. In this dialogue, Trypho is portrayed as being very impressed by Justin Martyr's arguments and nearly coming to accept them.
- Testimony _ Collections of Old Testament texts the purpose of which was to prove different claims connected with the person of Christ and the call of the Gentiles. Served as a "handy compendium of arguments for possible controversies" with Jews (Parkes, p. 99). An example is that of the third century African church father, Cyprian, The Testimonies against the Jews.
- sermons or homilies _ A group of writings which was "especially directed against the Jews" (Parkes, 71). They served to warn Christians of the dangers of associating with the Jewish people and were developed as an absolute condemnation of the Jewish people, religion, and cultural practices. Example: Church Father John Chrysostom _ Adversus Judaeos, eight sermons preached at Antioch in 386-388 (Parkes, 119).
By the second century C.E., both Judaism and Christianity were trying to distinguish each from the other in the eyes of Rome, as both had unique political concerns. Judaism by then had attained legal status in the Roman world as a religion and did not want Christianity, with its loyalty to a King other than Caesar, to be associated with it. The church, now largely Gentile, also wanted to obtain legal status in the eyes of Rome so that it would not be identified with the Jews, who had rebelled against Rome under Bar Kochba. Once it was clear to Rome that Christianity was not a sect of Judaism, Christianity was regarded as an illegal sect and was no longer under the protective umbrella of the legal status of Judaism. With the establishment of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire by Constantine in the fourth century, however, Christianity soon began to enjoy a position of superiority over Judaism which caused serious consequences for Judaism. The new "Christian" empire began to enact such changes as:
- The removal of former religious and governing privileges
- The curtailment of Rabbinical jurisdiction
- Prohibition of missionary work
- Jews were no longer allowed to hold high offices or have military careers (e.g. legislation in 537 C.E. which prohibited local Jewish people from serving on municipal bodies).
Negative theological attitudes began to abound, such as the idea that Jews had lost their right to exist; Jews only exist as a testimony to the truth of Christianity; Jews are suffering justly at the hands of the Gentiles because God is angry with them, etc. Various church councils drew up damaging anti-Jewish legislation such as:
- banning contact with Jews
- the forbidding of the reading of the Torah exclusively in Hebrew (553 C.E.) (see Parkes, 251ff, 392).
- confiscation of Jewish property and the prohibition of the sale of Christian property to Jews (545 C.E.).
Subsequent writings by church fathers (and church leaders throughout church history) condemned Jews, accusing them of being idolaters, torturers, spiritually deaf, blasphemers, gluttons, adulterers, canibals, Christ-killers, and beyond God's forgiveness. Church Father John Chrysostom in particular pushed the idea of Jewish sensuality, gluttony, stubbornness and rejection by God.
With the rise of the Church-State, certain religio-political attitudes such as Jesus ruling the world through the Roman Christian government became evident in the Church. This attitude of superiority, flamed by the ever-increasing integration of the Church into Roman government, continued on into the Middle Ages and was translated into repeated actual restrictions on Jews, as is evidenced by the following examples.
The Justinian Code
The Justinian Code was an edict of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian (527-564). A section of the code negated civil rights for Jews. Once the code was enforced, Jews in the Empire could not build synagogues, read the Bible in Hebrew, gather in public places, celebrate Passover before Easter, or give evidence in a judicial case in which a Christian was a party. Decrees by the early Catholic Church (partial list)
- Synod of Elvira (306)_prohibited intermarriage and sexual intercourse between Christians and Jews, and prohibited them from eating together.
- Councils of Orleans (533-541)_prohibited marriages between Christians and Jews and forbade the conversion to Judaism by Christians.
- Trulanic Synod (692)_prohibited Christians from being treated by Jewish doctors.
- Synod of Narbonne (1050)_prohibited Christians from living in Jewish homes.
- Synod of Gerona (1078)_required Jews to pay taxes to support the Church.
- Third Lateran Council (1179)_prohibited certain medical care to be provided by Christians to Jews.
- Fourth Lateran Council (1215)_required Jews to wear special clothing to distinguish them from Christians.
- Council of Basel (1431-1443)_forbade Jews to attend universities, them from acting as agents in the conclusion of contracts between Christians, and required that they attend church sermons.
Crusades
The Catholic Church launched a series of nine holy wars from 1096-1272. The purpose of these wars was to march to the Holy Land of Palestine and liberate it from Moslem "infidels." Along the way, the crusaders massacred all "infidels" in their path who refused to be baptized on the spot to Christianity. Thousands of Jews were massacred in Germany and France.
Blood Libel and the Black Death
In the Middle Ages, Jews were accused of all kinds of slanders and were scapegoats for the problems of the day.
- Blood Libel _ In 1144, a myth began in England that Jews murdered Christian children. This myth was expanded to become an accusation which persisted for centuries that the Jews used the blood of Christian children in the preparation of their Passover unleavened bread (matzohs). This "blood libel" was ironic in that the consumption of any blood is expressly prohibited by Jewish law.
- Black Death_ the bubonic plague, the cause of the Black Death that liquidated a quarter of the population of Europe in the 14th century, was blamed on the Jews in Europe and Asia. The Pope issued a bull declaring that Jews were not responsible for the plague, but not before many Jews were burned alive or hanged by enraged mobs.
During this period, Jews were permitted to be moneylenders and act as financiers, only because this activity, while necessary for a prosperous economy, was viewed by the Church as sinful. Because Jews enjoyed a monopoly over an activity viewed as sinful, a Jewish stereotype was perpetuated.
The only real answer to anti-Semitism is to reject it out of hand, renounce it everywhere, and respond vigorously when it appears. The true enemy is not a people or a group, but Satan who seeks the very destruction of the Jewish people that God's plans and purposes might be thwarted.
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April 5, 2007 - If wine has leaven, why is it OK for Passover?
First, what makes something kosher for Passover is not that it hasn't risen, but that it hasn't been made from a grain that was wet for more than 18 minutes (so say the rabbis!).
The five prohibited biblical grains are wheat, barley, oats, rye, and spelt; Ashnkenazim added fences around the Torah to include corn, rice, beans, etc., and with those even oils and starches and other derivatives, as well as yeast itself. Aging and rising is fine; grains rising from long exposure to water is not. (Cheese and yogurt are OK; non-grain souffles are fine; much alcohol is thus also kosher for passover, including wines and most liquours, though beer and grain alcohols are not). As always, these are the traditional categories; we each follow them in the ways we see fit.
As for year-round kashrut of wines, it's actually counter-intuitive, and even offensive to many. For other foodstuffs, kashrut means avoiding contamination by forbidden ingredients, which is often a good thing. For wines, on the other hand, "kosher" means "uncontaminated by gentiles!" It made sense eons ago, in an era of blood libels and highly specified ritual uses for certain wines, to keep Jewish and gentile production processes apart. Today, some see no extra value in wine being "kosher," and arguably find an ethical value in avoiding it.
With few exceptions, neither pork (year-round) nor bread (Pesach) finds its way into a nice merlot or cabernet—so whatever looks good is fair game, in many people's estimation. With all that said, there's plenty of Golan & Gamla & Baron Herzog & other decent, affordable bottles of kosher-but-way-better-than-Manischewitz wine out there. And remember to always serve a non-alcoholic grape juice option as well.
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The following outline explains the basics of the very intricate set of laws that govern kosher food. Proper implementation of these rules is achieved only by close consultation with a kosher expert.
The laws of kosher food originate in the Bible, and have been observed by Jews for over 3,300 years. There are three categories of kosher food - meat, dairy, and parve.
1. Meat - For an animal to be kosher, it must have split hooves and it must chew its cud. (Examples: cow, goat, lamb.) Non-kosher animals include pig, camel, and rabbit. Fowl such as chicken, turkey, certain duck, and certain goose are kosher. Animals and fowl must be slaughtered by a specialist (a shochet) and then soaked and salted to remove the blood. All carnivorous (meat-eating) animals and fowl, and the blood of all animals and fowl, and any derivatives or products thereof, are not kosher.
2. Dairy - Milk and milk products (cheese, cream, butter, etc.) of a kosher animal are kosher and dairy. These may not be eaten in combination with meat or fowl.
3. Parve - Foods that contain neither meat nor dairy ingredients are termed "parve," which indicates a neutral state. All fruits, grains, and vegetables in their natural state are kosher and parve. Fish that have fins and scales are kosher and parve. Some examples are salmon, flounder, and halibut. Examples of non-kosher fish are shark, sturgeon, catfish, and swordfish. All reptiles, shellfish, and underwater mammals, and most insects, are not kosher. A parve item can become dairy when it is cooked together with a dairy food; it becomes meat when cooked with meat. (Example: vegetables produced together with meat may not be eaten with dairy and are no longer parve.)
MEAT AND DAIRY SEPARATION
The requirement to separate meat and dairy products applies not only to food, but also to the utensils used for storing, preparing, and serving these foods. Therefore, completely separate sets of pots, dishes, cutlery, etc., are standard in a kosher kitchen. There is a waiting period after eating meat before eating dairy, six hours in most communities. The waiting period also applies to foods that have been cooked with meat. A similar waiting period applies after eating hard cheese before eating meat. It should be noted that although fish is neither meat nor dairy, fish and meat may be eaten together. Kosher food produced on machinery previously used for non-kosher food may be rendered non-kosher.
KOSHERIZING
The process of making vessels, utensils, dishes, ovens, and sinks kosher is called kashering, or kosherizing. It is sometimes possible to make non-kosher equipment kosher. This is done under the watchful eye of a rabbi who is versed in the procedure, the nature of which will vary depending on the kind of equipment that is involved.
PASSOVER
Passover, the eight-day holiday that commemorates the Exodus of the Jewish people from bondage in Egypt to freedom and nationhood, involves a unique set of kosher laws. No leavened products may be consumed on Passover. Certain grain products and their derivatives, although kosher the rest of the year, may not be consumed during Passover. In addition, in many communities, legumes are not permitted on Passover. The equipment used for production of Kosher for Passover items must also be Kosher for Passover.
WINE
A special rule governs the production of wine. Even if all the ingredients in wine are of kosher origin, it is kosher only if production was done exclusively by Torah-observant Jews. The making of kosher wine can involve a significant investment of time and expense, with equipment being kosherized from previous production runs and a trained team of Torah-observant Jews stepping in to supervise the production of the kosher wine.
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