Today I want you to see the interaction over one more story in the Jewish Press. Here is their editorial and here is my response. What is yours?
Jews For Jesus
Thank you for posting your message on the jewishpress.com. Your message was received and will be posted soon after a brief review by our editors.
Title: Misplaced emphasis
Message: The editorial calling for evangelical Christian censure of Jews for Jesus is misplaced and will never happen. There is a fundamental misunderstanding of the message of Jews for Jesus that leads to such a strange editorial from the Jewish Press. Those of us in Jews for Jesus have never claimed to represent Judaism. We are Christians by faith who are Jews by birth. We insist that being Jewish is not first and foremost practicing the religion of Judaism but a matter of birthright and heritage. We have a right to insist on our heritage as Jews even if we dissent from the Jewish religion as taught by the rabbi's. Please don't accuse us of insisting that Judaism teaches Jesus is o.k. Believe me, we know full well it does not.
Jews For Jesus
By: Editorial Board
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
As has been widely reported, Jews for Jesus, a Christian missionary group, is once again out on the streets targeting Jews with the message that one can at the same time believe in Jesus and be Jewish. What is different in their new campaign is that the group has a grossly enhanced budget and a determination to make this year’s crusade the grand finale of its five-year global “Behold Your God” campaign.
According to the group’s executive director, instead of the usual core of 25 volunteers, more than 150 have arrived in New York and a sophisticated program of website offerings, concerts, films and public transportation advertising campaign has been mounted.
We recognize that mainstream evangelical Christian groups see the Jewish community as appropriate objects of evangelical importuning, but we are dismayed that the current onslaught has not drawn their criticism. After all, it is one thing to suggest that Jews are unfulfilled as a matter of Christian theology, but quite another to urge that Judaism itself is not inconsistent with belief in the signature element of Christianity.
We recognize that mainstream evangelical Christian groups see the Jewish community as appropriate objects of evangelical importuning, but we are dismayed that the current onslaught has not drawn their criticism. After all, it is one thing to suggest that Jews are unfulfilled as a matter of Christian theology, but quite another to urge that Judaism itself is not inconsistent with belief in the signature element of Christianity.
Thank you for posting your message on the jewishpress.com. Your message was received and will be posted soon after a brief review by our editors.
Title: Misplaced emphasis
Message: The editorial calling for evangelical Christian censure of Jews for Jesus is misplaced and will never happen. There is a fundamental misunderstanding of the message of Jews for Jesus that leads to such a strange editorial from the Jewish Press. Those of us in Jews for Jesus have never claimed to represent Judaism. We are Christians by faith who are Jews by birth. We insist that being Jewish is not first and foremost practicing the religion of Judaism but a matter of birthright and heritage. We have a right to insist on our heritage as Jews even if we dissent from the Jewish religion as taught by the rabbi's. Please don't accuse us of insisting that Judaism teaches Jesus is o.k. Believe me, we know full well it does not.
posted by DavidBrickner at 2:05 PM
12 Comments:
They keep confusing deception with genuine disagreement. Or maybe they can't conceive of their premise being false, that you can be Jewish and believe in Jesus, that they assume deception.
Your use of the word "heritage" is most unfortunate. In the Torah, as is well known in Jewish life, it is written, "The Torah that God gave to Moses is the heritage of the children of Israel."
The Good News Translation - Second Edition. translates it this way: "We obey the Law that Moses gave us, our nation's most treasured possession." while the RSV says "when Moses commanded us a law, as a possession for the assembly of Jacob." and the NRSV says "Moses charged us with the law, as a possession for the assembly of Jacob." David Stern's Complete Jewish Bible states, "the Torah Moshe commanded us as an inheritance for the community of Ya'akov." It is clearly the Torah as the repository of a commanded way of life that is in view here.
If you claim Jewish heritage while specifically disavowing Torah-living, your claim to be possessors of Jewish heritage seems confused at best, and deceptive at worst. What the Jewish community is reacting to is that you clearly REJECT your Jewish heritage.
You agree, as you state "We are Christians by faith. . . We insist that being Jewish is not first and foremost practicing the religion of Judaism." making it clear that you disown or bypass the very heritage [Torah-living, Deut 33:4] that you are claiming.
You need to use a different vocabulary if you want to sound cogent, or to embrace Torah living to resolve the dissonance.
Y'shua is the fulfillment of Torah. He is the 'Yes' and 'Amen' of all of God's promises.
Believers can and do differ on the details of how that plays out. David is promoting the Messiah, so your dilemma goes away.
Stuart Dauermann said:
"What the Jewish community is reacting to is that you clearly REJECT your Jewish heritage."
It's pretty presumptuous to tell another person whether or not they are rejecting their heritage. Jews have a HUGE spectrum of relating to Jewishness. Besides, the key question is how God wants us to relate to our Jewishness and obviously some others of us take issues with SD about that.
I've never had a question about my Jewish identity / history / heritage. My whole question before I came to faith in Jesus was, is it true? If it was true, then of course it was also Jewish.
Stuart, you live in a world where definitions are those of your own making. I have not rejected the Torah and you know it. I have rejected rabbinic judaism because it is not faithful to torah. It is trying to put a yoke of bondage on our people that God never intended. Under the New Covenant when I walk by the Spirit I am blessed to fulfill the righteous requirements of the Law. By following the Jewish Messiah Jesus I have embraced what it really means to be a Jew. Yet you who say you are a follower of Jesus are sounding more and more like those who would place the yoke. You speak of the Jewish community as though it were a monolith and you it's spokesperson. Your pedestal is tottering my friend.
I think I understand what bothered me the most about Stuart's comment.
He doesn't think man's deadness in sins and tresspasses is the biggest obstacle to faith.
David - I don't know what pedestal you are speaking of. Certainly I don't live on one, nor do I place others on one.
I agree with Rich that "It's pretty presumptuous to tell another person whether or not they are rejecting their heritage." Although I stand by my opinions as stated in my posting, it would have been ethically higher for me to have refrained from posting what I did. for it criticized David publicly. We could all do with greater restraint in these matters, couldn't we?
As for the Law itself being a yoke from which Messiah delivers us, there are other preferable interpretations of the proof-texts used to prop up this opinion. For example, if the Apostles meant that the Law itself was a yoke from which we ought to be delivered [see Acts 15:10], then why does Luke represent the same community as "how many thousands there are among the Jews of those who have believed; they are all zealous for the law," some ten or fifteen years later?
In addition, if the New Covenant delivers Jewish believers from the burdensome yoke of Torah, why Moses and the Prophets postulate that the "yoke" will be reimposed at the end of days when Israel is renewed through Messiah? [Ezekiel 36-37; Deut 30:1-10; Jeremiah 31]? And why does the Torah reading for this coming week include the following statement, attributed to God Himself? "Oh that they had such a mind as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their children for ever!"
As for the rabbis version of Torah obedience being the problem, I wonder why Yeshua says, "The Pharisees sit in Moses' seat, therefore do whatever they tell you to do." It seems to me at least that he affirms their authority to interpret Torah, although not their infallibility in doing so.
It seems clear to me that what is burdensome is certain oppressive attitudes that can and too often are communally imposed upon people with respect to the Torah observance. The Law itself is no burden, especially since it is, after all the gift of a gracious God. Otherwise, Psalm 119 needs to be excised from our Bibles.
I continue to believe that the allergy to Torah obedience and Jewish life which is evident among us is the legacy of supersessionism and of Christian anti-Judaism going back to the Second Century.
Again, I regret my public critique of David's practice here, but not my views which are sound, biblical, and growing convictions. I can read the Bible no other way.
And, in a series of comments that attack me for my position here, I find comments directed at me and misattributing my motives which are further examples of my own ethical breech.
To all who read these comments: notice to what a disgusting level Jewish believer public discourse has fallen. It is shameful.
I shall endeavor to refrain from posting here in the future.
Shalom
After rereading Stuart's comments and interacting with him via email, I jumped the gun and misrepresented Stuart by saying what I did in regards to his beliefs about man's deadness in sin and responses to the gospel. I apologize and ask his forgiveness.
I should have had Stuart clarify his position and make sure I knew what Stuart does indeed believe before jumping on him.
It's strange that Stuart Dauermann should comment on "what a disgusting level Jewish believer public discourse has fallen," and label it "shameful."
I call this strange because Mr. Dauermann's protege Sean Emslie has a blog(towardblog.blogspot.com) on which there are frequent attacks specifically directed at Jews for Jesus. Mr. Emslie has repeatedly labeled Jews for Jesus as "the greatest barrier between the Jewish people and the Jewish Messiah." His blog -- which is public -- encourages an atmosphere of hostility not only towards Jews for Jesus specifically, but towards all Jewish believers who do not agree with the philosophy of Messianic Judaism Mr. Emslie (and one would presume Mr. Dauermann as well) subscribe to.
If Mr. Dauermann wishes to address public discourse between Jewish believers and cry "shame!", then he might do well to start within his own house -- Mr. Emslie has posted on his blog that he is "a member of Ahavat Zion Synagogue in Beverly Hills, CA under the leadership of my rebbe and mentor, Rabbi Dr. Stuart Dauermann, PhD."
To Anonyomous,
One of the principles I operate on in my synagogue is treating adults like adults. I do not run their lives. Mr. Emslie is a very fine young man, and in fact is sitting in my office as I write this. I stand by everything I have said about shameful discourse and have so reminded Mr. Emslie . However, I have received a note from JFJ staff member Rich Robinson to whom I complained about things he had said about me and my views and or those of my friends. He told me that it is altogether proper for people to take public exception to public statements, and that this is par for the course in scholarly circles.
So, I wonder if Mr. Emslie's taking exception to David B's and JFJ's public positions somehow falls outside of those perameters, and if so, why?
I am consistent and stand by what I said. I do believe that there is a lot of mud slung in Messianic Jewish circles. However, I don't think differing is mud. I don't think Mr. Emslie ever stoops to slander, although he does take exception.
As an adult, I don't presume to direct him to do otherwise--he is my congregant, not my child. But for the reasons stated here, concerning JFJ's own in-house policy, I am wondering now why Mr. Emslie's critiques of JFJ are out of bounds and JFJ's critiques of myself or of Hashivenu, etc., not, at least from the vantage point of "Anonymous."
On acceptable and unacceptable public criticisms -
I invite those reading this blog to note which critical comments are made about PEOPLE rather than positions. I would suggst that publiclty villifying people is out of bounds. I have been falsely accused of doing so, even here, when what I took exception to was the position being set forth. And without doubt. sometimes people take criticism's of their positions very personally, which is then their problem and not that of their critics. Or so it seems to me.
Thanks.
Stuart
Anonymous,
It would have been nice if you could have made yourself known, yet I know "Anonymous" posts to many blogs.
Being that I am Mr. Emslie, about which you write I so join this discussion.
I am honored to be considered a protege of Rabbi Dauermann.
To my comments on JFJ they are made in the overall context of my blog (towardblog.com), that seeks to be an online source of defining Messianic Judaism, in defining there is a necessity to say what is and what is not that for which you are defining.
JFJ and Mr. Brickner in their own words place themselves outside the fold of Messianic Judaism (a fold they claim to be within). Messianic Judaism as I define it (and many others) is to be a JUDAISM that holds to the Messiahship of Yeshua.
Mr. Brickner above states:
Those of us in Jews for Jesus have never claimed to represent Judaism. We are Christians by faith who are Jews by birth. We insist that being Jewish is not first and foremost practicing the religion of Judaism but a matter of birthright and heritage. We have a right to insist on our heritage as Jews even if we dissent from the Jewish religion as taught by the rabbi's.
These words by Mr. Brickner show that JFJ is a part of Christianity and not Judaism and further states JFJ is separate from Judaism and the the rabbis, and by extension the "heritage" of the Jewish people.
Messianic Judaism to be authentic must be a JUDAISM, not a Jewish cultural form of Christianity. I espouse the former, JFJ the latter.
That is the divide, I espouse a Judaism for Yeshua, JFJ a Jewish styled Christianity for Jews.
As Rabbi Dauermann stated above, my comments are on public statements and not personal attacks on individuals. Like the Bereans of the Book of Acts, I put all teaching to the test of Scripture, where JFJ and it's spokespeople deviate from Scripture and call others to do likewise I must comment.
I hope this helps in this discussion.
Post a Comment
<< Home