(Summer 2002, revised
March 2004)
Recently I was leafing through the catalog of a
major Christian book supplier and came across a section they had termed "Messianic
Judaism." There were a few books in this section, but most of its space was
given to a nice selection of tallitot and kippot, challah covers and
candleholders, along with an offering of tambourines and shofars. This
supplier may be sympathetic to Messianic Judaism, but it treats the movement
like a song-and-dance show. Likewise, we can all think of a bearded friend
dressed mostly in black, who was not raised in a Jewish home, has no Jewish
ancestry and minimal Yiddishkeit, but still calls himself a "Messianic Jew."
However we decide to define Messianic Judaism, both our friends and our
detractors are already forming definitions of their own, which we may not want
to live with.
Even apart from this
issue, however, it remains our responsibility to define ourselves. We must say
who we are before others can properly hear us, respond to us, and perhaps join
us. When I have the opportunity to speak to a new audience, I find that I must
tell some of my own story before I gain their hearing. In telling my story,
however briefly, I establish who I am, and how I claim any right to speak to
them. Likewise, in Messianic Judaism, we must tell our own story before we will
gain an audience with anyone beyond ourselves. Furthermore, we must tell a
shared story, if we are to develop a common identity and evolve from religious
movement into true community. After three decades as a movement, we are still
in search of a shared story, in need of a viable identity that we can pass on
to the next generation. The time has come for us to define ourselves as
Messianic Jews.
This common,
self-defined identity is the subject of the Theology Committee statement
endorsed by the UMJC delegates at our 2002 annual meeting. The basic statement
says:
Messianic Judaism is a movement of Jewish congregations and
congre-gation-like groupings committed to Yeshua the Messiah that embrace the
covenantal responsibility of Jewish life and identity rooted in Torah,
expressed in tradition, and renewed and applied in the context of the New
Covenant.
I will comment briefly
on the expanded (indented) statement that follows, paragraph by paragraph
(indented, bold), and provide two addenda, the first offering a working
definition of Jewishness in general, and the second affirming a model for
Gentile participation in Messianic Judaism.
Jewish life is life in a
concrete, historical community. Thus, Messianic Jewish groupings must be fully
part of the Jewish people, sharing its history and its covenantal
responsibility as a people chosen by God. At the same time, faith in Yeshua
also has a crucial communal dimension. This faith unites Messianic Judaism and
the Gentile Christian Church, which is the assembly of the faithful from the
nations who are joined to Israel
through the Messiah. Together Messianic Judaism and the Gentile Church constitute
the one Body of Messiah, a community of Jews and Gentiles who in their ongoing
distinction and mutual blessing anticipate the shalom of the world to come.
Our story is not told in
isolation, but within the context of a larger story. To be "fully part of the
Jewish people" means that in Messianic Judaism we tell our story within the
larger Jewish story, as we must do to be true to our calling as a Jewish
movement for Messiah. Our share in the Jewish story is not an accident of
birth. Rather it entails a "covenantal responsibility" to live as members of a
people chosen by God and given in Scripture a unique set of instructions and
obligations; to live in a way that contributes to the survival and destiny of
the Jewish people.
We are Jewish not only
in a biblical sense, then, but also in living interaction with the whole of
our community and tradition, the "concrete, historical community" of which this
paragraph speaks. We are making the revolutionary claim that we are at home in
the Jewish community as we identify with Messiah. We do not leave our people,
join the mostly non-Jewish Church, and then return to testify of Messiah, but
we bear that testimony as part of the living, breathing Jewish people of today.
Our identity as human
beings begins with our creation in the image of God, and it reaches fulfillment
in Messiah, as Dan Juster pointed out in the 2001 UMJC Theology Forum. When we
say that we are a congregational movement "committed to Yeshua the Messiah,"
we affirm that essential identity in Messiah, which is God's incomparable gift
to us. Such identity, however, does not obliterate the categories of Jew and
Gentile. Scripture maintains the distinction between Israel and the nations throughout,
even into the New Covenant. This distinction remains in effect within the Body
of Messiah. The "Gentile Christian Church," like the Jewish people, is a
"concrete, historical community." It is not a theological abstraction, but
"the assembly of the faithful from the nations who are joined to Israel through
the Messiah." These two groups-the Messianic Jewish community and the Gentile
Christian Church-repre-sent within the one Body of Messiah Israel and the
nations, the two components of humankind portrayed throughout Scripture.
In his groundbreaking study The God of Israel and
Christian Theology,
R. Kendall Soulen speaks
of "God's economy of consummation," that is, God's work of perfecting the
goodness and holiness of his entire creation, including humankind. This work,
writes Soulen, "is essentially constituted as an economy of mutual blessing between
those who are and who remain different" (Minneapolis, Fortress Press, 1996, p.
111). It is to God's glory that both components of the human race meet in
mutual blessing within the Body of Messiah, and yet remain distinct. God is
glorified when Jews practice their unique calling and traditions even as they
honor Gentile believers as brothers and sisters in Messiah. God is glorified
when Gentile believers serve him as representatives of all the nations
alongside a remnant of the priestly nation Israel.
For a Messianic Jewish
grouping 1. to fulfill the covenantal responsibility incumbent upon all
Jews, 2. to bear witness to Yeshua within the people of Israel,
and 3. to serve as an authentic and effective representative of the Jewish
people within the body of Messiah, it must place a priority on integration
with the wider Jewish world. Such integration must then be followed by a vital
corporate relationship with the Gentile Christian Church.
The "priority on
integration with the wider Jewish world" for which this statement rightly calls
could imply a separation from the rest of the Body of Messiah. But to make such
an inference would be to accept the rift between Israel and Messiah as inevitable
and insurmountable. It would assume that we must choose one or the other.
Instead, we affirm a both/and approach, in which our Jewishness does not
counter our "Messianicness," but is rather the God-given vehicle of expressing
it. As Mark Kinzer demonstrated in an earlier Theology Forum, Israel and Body
of Messiah are qualitatively different categories, so that they are in no way
mutually exclusive or contradictory. This needs to become a new axiom in our
thinking.
Only if we ignore the
biblical reality of Messiah's coming within Israel
would we be moved to deny our full participation in Israel's story, or the priority of
"integration with the wider Jewish world." Yeshua, after all, is indeed the Jewish
Messiah. His coming and promised return fulfill the messianic hope founded
in the Hebrew Scriptures and maintained by our people for millennia. Indeed,
Messiah does not enter history in isolation but in the context of the Jewish
story. As Soulen writes, "Faith in the gospel presupposes the God of Israel's
antecedent purpose for creation, a purpose threatened by destructive powers but
vindicated by God in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus" (p. 156).
Scripture begins, not with Messiah, but with creation, then sin and exile, then
the promise of restoration, the calling of Israel, the expansion of the promise,
and finally the appearing of Messiah, "whom heaven must receive until the times
of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all his holy
prophets since the world began" (Acts 3:21).
When Messiah does
appear, as Stuart Dauermann points out in a recent article in Kesher ("Do
You See What I See?" Issue 14, Winter 2002, p. 78), "He is first the Messiah of
Israel, who unambiguously self-identified as a Jew, and was recognized as a Jew
by all who met him. You cannot have a Lord of the Church who is not first, last
and always the King of the Jews. He is not simply the cosmic Christ, the
Son-of-Man-Without-a-Country, the generic Savior, but bone of Jewish bone,
flesh of Jewish flesh, the Holy One of Israel, and Seed of David in whom alone
all the promises to Israel and the nations are ‘Yes' and ‘Amen.'"
Messiah models
identification with Israel,
yet we have often allowed our differences with rabbinic authority or with
Jewish customs to alienate us from Israel's continuing story, as in
the manner of Christian supersessionism. Messianic Judaism properly
understood, however, is a decisive counter to supersessionism; it embodies the
truth that God has revealed himself and his purposes within the story of the
Jewish people and does not need to set them aside to bring humankind to its
destination. Jews should remain Jews when they believe in Messiah, not in some
technical or token sense, but in practice and outlook, in family life and
community involvement.
Rav Shaul
makes two statements that we must maintain as well, despite the undeniable
tension between them. He says both, "I am a Jew, a Pharisee, a Hebrew of the Hebrews"(and this
many times), and "I count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge
of Messiah Yeshua my Lord." We do not dichotomize our faith in Messiah and our
Jewishness; rather we hold the incomparable legacy of Messiah within the
setting of Jewish life and tradition. If we believe that God's calling and
promises for Israel remain
in effect, and if we seek to restore this truth to the Body of Messiah, then Israel remains our
community, despite the failure of Jewish communal leadership to recognize
Yeshua as Messiah.
The Messianic Jewish way
of life involves an attempt to fulfill Israel's covenantal responsibility
embodied in the Torah within a New Covenant context. Messianic Jewish halakhah
is rooted in Scripture (Tanakh and the New Covenant writings), which is of
unique sanctity and authority. However, it also draws upon Jewish tradition,
especially those practices and concepts that have won near-universal acceptance
by devout Jews through the centuries. Furthermore, like most other branches of
Judaism, Messianic Judaism recognizes that halakhah must be dynamic as well as
faithful, for it involves the application of the Torah to a wide variety of
changing situations and circumstances.
Halakhah is a sign that
we take covenantal responsibility seriously. The life of obedience will not
just happen, but requires deliberate communal effort. This realization is a key
factor defining Messianic Judaism as a form of Judaism rather than as a Jewish
subgroup within the church. The communal discussion and application of Torah to
the details of everyday life is a uniquely Jewish enterprise. Some would
contrast the Christian emphasis on the guidance of the Spirit with the guidance
of this communal norm. But a Messianic Jewish halakhic process will seek the
Spirit's guidance even as it embraces the human responsibility to articulate
the divine instruction for a specific community.
The most important word in this paragraph may
be "attempt." We recognize the innovative nature of Messianic Judaism as we
envision it. To speak of halakhah at this stage is prescriptive rather than
descriptive. But we must take responsibility for halakhah, if we are to develop
a genuine Judaism that can be passed on to the next generation. "R. Tarfon
says: The day is short, the task is great, the workers are lazy, the reward is
great and the Master is insistent. You are not expected to complete the work
and yet you are not free to evade it" (Pirke Avot 2:15-16).
Messianic Judaism
embraces the fullness of New Covenant realities available through Yeshua, and
seeks to express them in forms drawn from Jewish experience and accessible to
Jewish people.
We recognize that all
Judaisms are in a sense messianic. Michael Wyschogrod goes so far as to write,
"Authentic Judaism must be messianic Judaism. Messianic Judaism is Judaism
that takes seriously the belief that Jewish history, in spite of everything
that has happened, is prelude to an extraordinary act of God by which history
will come to its climax and the reconciliation between God and man, and man and
man realized" (The Body of Faith, Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1996,
pp. 254-255).
In what way, then, are
we unique among Judaisms? First, because our messianic hope is centered on
Yeshua the Nazarene. And, second, because we are the Judaism of Messianic
presence. We share in the unfinished story of Israel, but our Messiah has
appeared already. He is the first fruits of all that is to come, and he remains
present among us through his Spirit. This is what distinguishes us within
Judaism: the activity and life of the Spirit in our midst, a sense of the
immediacy of the divine, and evident healings, words, visions, and power.
Through the Spirit, the justice and peace of the age to come are already being
established among us. Such conditions create a faith community that becomes a
viable option for Jewish people.
We await the same
messianic hope as all Israel.
Hence, we participate fully in the yearly cycle and the prayers of the Siddur,
which are filled with Messianic expectancy. We cry out with our people for the
restoration of Israel
and the worldwide redemption that will bring renewal to all the families of the
earth. Our distinction is that we claim through Yeshua to experience in this
age a foretaste of that redemption before it comes in fullness in the age to
come.
To speak of Messianic
Judaism as a branch or form of Judaism implies a pluralistic view of Judaism
that some might find troubling. But to see ourselves as a Judaism does not
deny a unique claim for Messianic Judaism, because of the presence of Messiah
in our midst. It simply expresses respect for other forms, since we recognize
God at work in them. We do not claim to supersede other Judaisms, even though
we have found the Messiah that they still await. Furthermore, defining
ourselves within Judaism and the Jewish people is essential to true
intercession, for the intercessor must identify with those for whom he
intercedes. We can think of Moses, who refused to distance himself from Israel,
even after the sin of the Golden Calf, of Jeremiah, who went with the
disobedient remnant down to Egypt, or of Rav Shaul, who wrote, "For I could
wish that I myself were accursed from Messiah for my brethren, my countrymen
according to the flesh" (Romans 9:3). We maintain a Jewish identity because we
stand with our people, and this stand is in no way diminished because we are
also in Messiah.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
placed a challenge before us nearly a half century ago: "For us Jews there can
be no fellowship with God without the fellowship with the people Israel.
Abandoning Israel,
we desert God" (God in Search of Man, New York: Farrar, Strauss, and
Giroux, 1976, p. 423). In Messiah Yeshua, of course, we have been freely
granted fellowship with God. Nevertheless, if we stand outside Israel, even though we proclaim Messiah to Israel, we lose our share in Israel's calling, our intercessory position on
behalf of Israel
and the nations, and our hold on a significant aspect of God's eternal purpose.
When we imagine our
primary community of reference to be the visible church, we must define
ourselves within that church by our Jewishness, but when our community of
reference is Israel-
our Jewish people and their tradition-we define ourselves within that setting
by our loyalty to Messiah. It is far more compelling to the Jewish people we
are called to serve, and more biblically consistent, to place ourselves within
Israel
standing for Messiah, than within the visible church standing for Jewish roots.
Too long have we sought
to distinguish ourselves within the Christian community by our Jewish emphasis.
Instead, let us be recognizably Jewish, a movement within the Jewish community
that distinguishes itself by our response to the spirit of Messiah in our
midst.
Russell L. Resnik is General Secretary of
the UMJC.
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