"A proof of Jewishness"
What makes Jews real Jews? What makes Gerim Jews?
A humble ezurach's view
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V'shamru b'nai Yisrael et ha-Shabbat La-asot et ha-Shabbat l'dorotam b'rit olam Baynee oo-vayn b'nay Yisrael ote hee l'olam Kee shayshet yameem asah Adonai Et ha-shamahyeem v'et ha-aretz Oo-vah yome ha-shveeyee Shavaht vah-eenahfahsh
Exodus 31: 16-17 |
A few years ago, there was a physician in town who believed that his ancestors were Jews and his wife was a Lutheran but she believes that one of the parents was a Jew. This couple came to a local Messianic Jewish congregation to participate. That local MJ congregation has 5% Jews and 95% Gentiles. They apparently had some concern that if they could be recognized as "Jews" to receive a certain respect, and asked a rabbi if they had to demonstrate any type of proof of Jewishness to join in the Messianic congregation. They said to the rabbi that they were seriously interested in having a bone marrow biopsy for gene analysis to prove that they carry biological evidence (if such a thing exists however) of Jewishness. This rabbi kindly and courteously explained the physician couple that there is an even more important marker of Jewishness than biological proof; anyone who love God and his commandments are a Jew because God could even rise sons of Avrahaam out of stones, so anyone who accept Yeshua as Messiah and follow His commandments can be a Messianic Jew; so biopsy-proven Jewishness is irrelevant. Then, this couple became so upset and never came back to the messianic congregation For this "Jewish" physician, physical evidence was more important to be Jewish than spiritual basics.
Last year, a famous Japanese Christian man who has strong sympathy to Jewish people told me that "You are not right by identifying yourself as a 'Messianic Jew' while you believing in Yeshua so you should call yourself 'Messianic Christian' instead." Then, a few months later, I was requested from one of a Jewish member of congregation out of the state not to call us "Messianic Jews" because he said, "You are Gentile." Ever since them, I experienced several interesting E-mail discussion with this man and the discussion illustrated the underlying problems regarding the understanding of Jewishness. Let me explain this rather interesting discussion briefly.
First of all, the points of their oppositions are following.
(1)
The Jewish man and the Christian man insisted that Jewishness is a nationality. God is not in the business of amalgamating all nations into one nation. Rather, God valued diversity and let different countries and tribe exists in the world. If you were born in Japanese, you are Japanese; if you were born in Iran, you are an Iranian; and so on. You cannot change later from one to another arbitrary. Therefore, if you were bone as non-Jewish, it is not honest (or even deceptive) to call yourself a "Messianic Jew."(2)
A Christian man said that Christianity is for non-Jews and Jewish religion is for Jews; so you should not call yourself a Messianic Jew but a Christian.(3)
Although Ruth, who was a Moabite, was accepted to the Jewish community, she was not accepted as a Jew, but accepted as a proselyte.The following points were explained back to them.
(1)
I do not ignore the powerful sentiment and nationalism of Israel. Zionism was the major motivation in restoring the Jewish state in the Middle East. I am by no means anti-Zionist. However, nationalism as well as Zionism is nothing but human's zealous will for the country. That is nothing wrong by itself but not based on religion. There are many other countries where you encounter strong nationalism. The most important thing which makes Jewish nationalism different from all other nationalism in the world is religion. If they do not have faith to God, their nationality will not be even maintained. For this reason, you should give up an idea that Jewishness is categorized nationality. Instead, Jewishness is based on God's high calling given to Avrahaam. Jews should seek their own identity not to their nationalism, but to the faith to God. Resorting to bone marrow biopsy to obtain reassurance for God's promise is nonsense in this context.(2)
I am concerned that still quite a lot of Christians believe that "Messianic Jews are for Jews and Christianity is for Christians", which is not correct. Messianic Jews accept a lot of Gentile members, who were by no means called "Messianic Gentile" because they accept the same principle and commandments in the name of Yeshua. There is absolutely no evidence that early churches treated Jews and Gentile differently (write to me if you disagree). You should also realize that the word "Christian" was artificial. It was a nickname made up by the Roman government to call the early Messianic believers. Later "Christians" became totally forgot its original Jewishness, and received some paganistic influence and anti-Semitic attitude to form Roman Catholic. The Protestant churches could overcome some of them but not totally back to the spirit of the early church yet. So, if you really wish to experience the spiritual revival that disciples experienced, your church should be more like "Messianic Jews."(3)
I was somewhat surprised that even some of the Messianic leaders believed that "Ruth is not a Jew but a proselyte." I will explain here why this is blatantly wrong by a rather shocking example. If you do not accept that proselyte is not a Jew, according to the Deuteronomy 23:3, "An Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD; even to their tenth generation shall they not enter into the congregation of the LORD for ever," Ruth's decedents should not have been allowed to join in the Jewish congregation for at least next ten generations. However, King David was only three generations down from Ruth (please read Ruth 4:21-22 to confirm for yourself). In other words, if you insist that Ruth was accepted as a proselyte but not as a Jew in face of this strict law, you are forced to conclude that the King David was not a Jew. Is that OK with you?Moreover, let me tell you something in case if you do not know, once upon a time, there was a king named Izates in Damascus in 4th century BC. One day this man accepted Jewish faith and became a proselyte king! At the same time, hundreds of his countrymen also accepted Jewish faith and commandments. However, the Talmud treated this large number of "proselytes" as "Jews" and gave them full privilege of Jewish communities. Onkelos was a Greek man who accepted Jewish faith and became a Jew. He became a great Jewish historian. Shemaya and Abtalyon were the contemporary Rabbi whose mothers were Gentiles for both. When these mothers became "proselytes," these kids followed moms. According to the Talmud, these kids became great Rabbis. One day, other young Rabbis ridiculed them with envy, as they became Rabbi though they were proselytes. An elderly Rabbi heard these "biologically pure Jewish" young Rabbis saying that, he reprimanded them and told them that was not right thing to say. Knowing these historical facts exists; saying "a proselyte is not a Jew" does not have ground to stand.
There is no question that biological Jews may deserve special attention just because they are descendants of Avrahaam and God has a special plan to use them. However, I am afraid I must point out that a lot of Jews (even including Messianic Jews) do yet not understand what does "Jewishness" really means. First of all, Jewishness is not nationalistic concept but religious concept. God chose Avrahaam because of his extraordinary faith to Him so that Avrahaam and his descendent may be representative of God and His principle. In other words, Jews were religiously oriented people from the beginning. They were allowed to exist because they were chosen to love God and to faithfully obey his commandments. Then, what is the merit of Jewishness? The merits are Trusting God, Believing in God, Following His commandments, and Hoping that Messiah King is coming. Nationalistic arrogance and pride of its status should have absolutely NO room for Jewishness, right?
If you really love your Hashem, you should love His commandments and follow them in your best. However, practically speaking, not all of Jews remember all of the 613 commandments. If you insist to obey these 613 commandments in the Torah to be recognized as a Jew, I am afraid that you may be criticized as legalistic. God knows that you cannot make yourself perfect only by your effort; that is why you need to be saved by Messiah Yeshua. Here is the challenge. If you wish to claim yourself a Jew (or Messianic Jew) out of various reasons, why some of you does not even try to observe the Shabbat completely sacred. If you have love to God, would the 7th day Sabbath keeping be the first and the most fundamental commandment to observe to start with rather than practicing singing cantor in Hebrew language or learning how to play with dreidel? Harman Wauks, an famous pious American-Jewish scenario writer, said that a "Jew" who does not observe the Shabbat is by no means a Jew, which I, a gentile, agree with by 100%.
Look at the Seventh-Day Adventists. They are apparently not Jews, but they observe the seventh day Sabbath and there is otherwise no practical difference between SDA and the rest of decent protestant churches beside the observation of Sabbath on Saturday. Nevertheless, they were blessed better than other generic protestant churches just for it. The SDA church was counted as one of the fastest growing protestant churches. I do not hesitate to say that they were even better blessed spiritually than Jews who did not observe the seventh day Shabbat every week! I was a witness for the blessing of the church. Now, I am sure that anyone will be blessed if you believe in Yeshua as Messiah, and paying respect to His laws by observing the Shabbat. Please do not think that I am saying my opinion here, but this is what the Bible promised in Exodus 31 and Isaiah 58:13 and 14.
Now I challenge to Christians. If you have willingness to support and pray for Jewish people, why you keep remaining "Christian"? Is being a Christian better than being a Jew who believes in Yeshua? Why not you may be a Messianic Jew? If Christian means that you do not have to follow the commandment of God with love because Jesus Christ abolish Laws, please forget about it and let a dog eat such a thought. If you believe in and love Jesus, why would you rather step ahead to the higher calling ground by accepting his commandments with love to Jesus (Yeshua) to follow the footsteps of "Jews". Please discard your prejudice that says Jewish people are legalistic with no love. Remember that they are willing to follow God's commandments because they love God the best on the earth. Remember that there was no such thing like "Christian Church" at the time of Jesus, Mary, Paul, Peter, and other disciples. These people were Jews and they followed commandments and loved God, and start sharing the Gospel to non-Jewish people and encourage them to walk within the same light. They were Messianic Jews. Did these first Messianic Jews observed the Sunday for Sabbath? Apparently no. One of the New Testament writers now recommend you the entire Christian churches that
"Remember then from what you have fallen, repent and do the works you did at first... (Revelation 2:5; RSV)" For this reason, as Messianic Judaism believers, restoring the seventh day Sabbath is the first step to retrieve the relation between God and human being. If you love God as well as Jews love God, please make a decision to start observing Sabbath from this week.Observation of the Shabbat and keep the Sabbath day holy according with the ten commandments is the first step for higher calling for you.
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