Jewish Book: How to Read the Bible

[steveb1]

Jharek, thanks for the nice words. Yes, those who think that Judaism is “satanic” are either blind bigots and/or criminally under-educated. The “Jews as Christ-killers” myth continues to haunt the more vacuous minds among us, and is plausibly one of the foundational pillars ot the equally batty notion that Judaism is “satanic”.

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

I expressed no objection to Christianity

You belittled the Great Commission" as a “perceived mission”. You ridiculed the Church as “Supersessionism.” You called Christianity “Paulinism.”

I expressed objection to overly zealous evangelizers who tempt Jews away from Torah; objection to hypocritical Christians who fear “Jewish proselytization” while simultaneously trying to get Jews to abandon their faith; objection to the vicious Supersessionist view that claims Christianity replaced Judaism.

I didn’t say anything in this thread about evangelizing to Jews. I have not credited the Jews of wanting to convert Christians to Judaism. I only said that the intention of a Jew would be to lead you away from Christ, in response to someone who said he wanted to use a Jewish book to find the NT in the OT. That is inarguable.

I claim Christianity is the completion of Judaism. And, Rabbinic Judaism is a corruption of Judaism.

I am neither a Jew nor an atheist, although I wonder why your mistaken claim that I made objection to Christianity would propel you to conclude that I must be one of those two mindsets, whereas I could just as easily, equally, be Pagan, Agnostic, Buddhist, Hindu, Taoist, Confucian, etc.

Are you trying to say you’re Buddhist?

 

[Lisel]

I have read this book. I think the title of your thread is misleading. It is not written from a jewish perspective, as much as it is from that of a biblical scholar.

It is a fascinating book. It is not, however, a “Jewish” book.

 

[Kaninchen]

I only said that the intention of a Jew would be to lead you away from Christ,

Why would we want to do that?

Ask us and we’ll tell you we don’t believe in it, ask us why and we’ll tell you why we don’t believe in it but most of us don’t really care whether you believe in it or not.

 

[steveb1]

Steel Pinwheel;7370944 to steveb1
]You belittled the Great Commission" as a “perceived mission”. You ridiculed the Church as “Supersessionism.” You called Christianity “Paulinism.”​

Wrong. I ridiculed Supersessionism as Supersessionism. If the Church, Catholic or otherwise, imagines that it’s a replacement for the Judaism, Torah, and Covenant that God, Jesus, and Paul said would last forever, then those churches are plainly wrong. I said WRONG, which is a simple judgment, NOT “ridicule”.

Of course the Great Commission is a perceived mission for the simple reason that the only witnesses to its proclamation were the apostles, who have been dead for centuries. The following generations take the Commission on faith and on scriptural authority. But you made the evaluation that I was equating the predatory evangelism of over-zealous Christians and “Jewish Messianic” Christians with the Great Commission. I wasn’t.

And I did not call Christianity “Paulinism”. I said that the “Jews for Jesus” are Paulinists, Creationists, and Fundamentalists.​

“I didn’t say anything in this thread about evangelizing to Jews. I have not credited the Jews of wanting to convert Christians to Judaism. I only said that the intention of a Jew would be to lead you away from Christ, in response to someone who said he wanted to use a Jewish book to find the NT in the OT. That is inarguable.”

What’s inarguable is that you don’t read very carefully. Once you say that a Jew’s intention is to lead Christians away from Christ, you have accused Jews of evangelism - granted, a reverse kind of backdoor evangelism, but evangelism nonetheless.​

“I claim Christianity is the completion of Judaism. And, Rabbinic Judaism is a corruption of Judaism.”

You have the right to express your opinions. My opinion is that Christianity is not the fulfillment of Judaism, a religion and a community designed by its God as full and complete in itself, and history supports my claim.
If you want to claim that rabbinic Judaism is a corruption of Judaism, you might cite Jewish sources that make this claim. Otherwise, you look like an outsider criticising insiders for flaws they should be well aware of and be actively working at correcting.​

“Are you trying to say you’re Buddhist?”

Are you trying to invade my privacy? The issues at hand are independent of my personal faith or lack thereof. Again, it’s strange that from my list of several religious options, including agnosticism and atheism, that you would select-out Buddhism. Not to invade YOUR privacy, but do you have something against Buddhists?

 

[djeter]

“Biblical sufferers touch us through their shared pain. In our fractured and difficult lives, reading a chronicle of difficulty and failure can be encouraging and even healing. The heroes of the Bible are not perfect, their marriages are not storybook, their relations with children not friction-less. All of us who struggle with real problems of families, of work, can look to the Bible not as one looks at a fairy tale, but with the recognition that everything has changed since the time of Abraham and Sarah except human nature.”

more here:

payingattentiontothesky.com/2010/01/26/rabbi-david-wolpe-on-reading-the-bible/

Rabbi Wolpe shares some wonderful observations.

dj

 

[steveb1]

Why would we want to do that?

Ask us and we’ll tell you we don’t believe in it, ask us why and we’ll tell you why we don’t believe in it but most of us don’t really care whether you believe in it or not.

===

Exactly one of the points I was attempting to make in other posts. Judaism can’t lead you to the Christian Christ, but it can lead you to the God of Jesus and other New Testament and early Christian figures.

The earliest “Christianity” WAS a form of Judaism - an odd, sectarian, out-of-the-mainstream sort of Judaism, but still Judaism. The righteous Jewish prophet Jesus (as attested in Peter’s earliest sermons in Acts) was raised up by the Jewish God and enthroned in heaven like the Standing Son of Man in the Jewish books of Daniel, Isaiah, and Ezekiel. He said his mission was only to Israel, who were to have the children’s food rather than the scraps from the householder’s table. Even Paul had to remind haughty Gentile converts that they were being grafted, in these latter days, to the vine of Israel. And the first persecutions of “the church” were not by Jews against Christians, but rather by mainstream Jewish authorities against an upstart Jewish sect that acknowledged a martyred prophet as Messiah and risen/exalted “Son”.

Some modern Jews - but certainly not the so-called “Messianic” Jews - are trying to carry on the original pre-Pauline Jewish-sectarian understanding of Jesus, under a general umbrella of “Ebionites”, “Nazoreans”, etc. But other than this minority movement, mainline Judaism will not and cannot lead anyone to Jesus, for the simple reasons 1) that most Christian claims about Jesus are unaccepted and unacceptable to Jews, and 2) Judaism has flourished to the present day without worshiping Jesus or being “Christian” in any other meaningful way.

But being neither able or willing to to lead people to Jesus is not the same thing as wanting to lead people away from him. A Christian converting to Judaism will not find a replacement for Jesus, or “Satan”, but only an absence - an absence of a* Christian* “Lord and Savior” who is irrelevant to Judaism. Instead, the Christian convert will find many of the basics that Jesus and his Jewish disciples knew and practiced, as redifined by the rabbis and others after the fall of Jerusalem.

Most practicing Jews do not want to lead Christians away from Christ. They would like to see Judaism flourish by observing Torah and showing love of their God by fulfilling his commandments. If Gentiles want to convert, fine. If not, fine - Gentiles always, already, have their own Yahwistic covenant, which was struck with Noah - and which James recommended for Gentiles converts as long ago as the first council in Jerusalem, as noted in the book of Acts.

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

Wrong. I ridiculed Supersessionism as Supersessionism. If the Church, Catholic or otherwise, imagines that it’s a replacement for the Judaism, Torah, and Covenant that God, Jesus, and Paul said would last forever, then those churches are plainly wrong. I said WRONG, which is a simple judgment, NOT “ridicule”.

I’ve not seen anyone argue that the Church has replaced Judaism. The Church is Judaism, completed Judaism. Bringing up Supersessionism is an attempt to ridicule what the church is. The position of the Catholic church is that the Jews were God’s people, now everyone is God’s people. That’s not replacement, that’s expansion.

Of course the Great Commission is a perceived mission for the simple reason that the only witnesses to its proclamation were the apostles, who have been dead for centuries.

Jesus spoke it to the Apostles, but what did Jesus say to make you think it was limited to them? Why would any Christian not want to share the Good News? Evangelism is an act of caring about others.

And I did not call Christianity “Paulinism”. I said that the “Jews for Jesus” are Paulinists, Creationists, and Fundamentalists.

Not to mention a contradiction in terms.

What’s inarguable is that you don’t read very carefully. Once you say that a Jew’s intention is to lead Christians away from Christ, you have accused Jews of evangelism - granted, a reverse kind of backdoor evangelism, but evangelism nonetheless.

Evangelism is trying to bring people to your faith. Jews do not try to bring people to their faith. They simply try to end faith in Jesus. (I doubt if I had said Muslims have no intention of leading people to Christ, that I would have any disagreements.)

If you want to claim that rabbinic Judaism is a corruption of Judaism, you might cite Jewish sources that make this claim. Otherwise, you look like an outsider criticising insiders for flaws they should be well aware of and be actively working at correcting.

The Jewish sources that claim that Rabbinical Judaism is a corruption… these sources are called Christians. I’m an insider who is pointing out that those who reject the Jewish messiah are rejecting the true Jewish faith. Even if I were an outsider, you’re asking me to commit the error of appeal to authority.

Are you trying to invade my privacy? The issues at hand are independent of my personal faith or lack thereof. Again, it’s strange that from my list of several religious options, including agnosticism and atheism, that you would select-out Buddhism. Not to invade YOUR privacy, but do you have something against Buddhists?

Maybe “mystical seeker” sounds kind of Buddhist, and you already denied being a Jew or an Atheist (which includes agnosticism).

 

[Vince1022]

At least you know more about Jews than Vince.

Please help. What don’t I know? Thanks!

And of course if you have any responses to my comments on your posts I would appreciate it.

 

[Kaninchen]

Jews do not try to bring people to their faith. They simply try to end faith in Jesus.

How about doing a bit of explanation of how we’re doing that?

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

Please help. What don’t I know? Thanks!

To repeat myself:

Jews have their own NT. It’s called the Talmud.

Jews tend to be Atheists.

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

How about doing a bit of explanation of how we’re doing that?

It’s really stupid that anyone needs to be told that any one not of the Christian faith is not in the business of promoting the Christian faith.

 

[Kaninchen]

It’s really stupid that anyone needs to be told that any one not of the Christian faith is not in the business of promoting the Christian faith.

That’s not what you said though, you said “to end faith in Jesus”. So, how is it that we’re supposedly doing that?

 

[Kaninchen]

To repeat myself:

Jews have their own NT. It’s called the Talmud.

Jews tend to be Atheists.

Tell us how the Talmud is the equivalent of the NT.

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

That’s not what you said though, you said “to end faith in Jesus”. So, how is it that we’re supposedly doing that?

If you read a Jewish book about the Bible, it will not be designed to promote the Christian faith but to refute the Christian faith. Duh.

 

[Lisel]

How about doing a bit of explanation of how we’re doing that?

Anti-Jesus power crystals.

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

You’re wrong for two reasons. Actually three, but no need to mention the third.

1. The very nature of anyone’s interpretation is contrary to conflicting interpretations (that’s a big DUH, except for the multisyllabic words). This is pure and simple logic, not an assumption. A Jew doesn’t need to see his own faith as set against Christianity for him to offer interpretations contrary to Christianity.
2. Yes, Jews do “see their own faith as set against the paradigm of the Christian faith.” But, if you don’t accept simple logic, you’re not going to accept a reasonable conclusion. Jews live in a Christian culture (unless they live in Israel, where Christianity is oppressed). Christian views of the Old Testament dominate discourse. It’s psychologically impossible for a Jew to provide commentary on the Old Testament without a reaction to Christianity weighing in.

 

[qui_est_ce]

For Christians, the OT should be interpreted as pointing to the NT. In order to understand the symbolism, types, and narratives, one must have an understanding of the period in which the book was written. One cannot read the OT through today’s lenses.

For example, Abraham sacrificing his only son, Isaac, a Christian sees it as the type pointing to God sacrificing his only son Jesus.

In the NT, the story of the Prodigal Son is the story of Israel, faithless, going into exile, and coming home.

 

[irishpatrick]

His Holiness Benedict XVI recommends study of the Jewish insights into scripture. See the document from the Pontifical Biblical Commission, The Jewish People and their Scripture (JP&S), available in the EWTN document library.

I’m trying to understand the Old Testament, even just to have a better understanding of what is there, for starters. From two solid years of looking at Jewish commentaries, I’ve learned a lot about the literary structure of the books in the OT. I see that as a pre-requisite for a better understanding of the NT.

As Benedict says in JP&S, we*** can’t ***understand the NT without the OT.

I’m looking for (as it is said) the NT is hidden in the OT, the OT is fulfilled in the NT. I want to understand that better.

Certainly there is so much more in the NT. One feature that should not be overlooked, as it is a main subject of the NT, is the mysticism of the NT that we are called to. I didn’t make it all the way through (the late) Fr. Thomas Dubay’s** Fire Within**, and I’m wandering into it again. (I get intellectually dizzy with his roundabout way of exposition.) But, he points out how essential it is to come to grips with the full calling of the NT to believers and the heights of religious experience that we are promised as our lifelong spiritual journey continues.

It is profoundly important to understand the OT, and it best learned through scholars who have learned it through Jewish eyes, and than applied the truths of the Christian on top of that so that the fullness of truth comes to light. Just flat out reading of Jewish interpretation of the OT makes no sense unless one is studying from Christians perspective.

 

[Steel_Pinwheel]

It is profoundly important to understand the OT, and it best learned through scholars who have learned it through Jewish eyes, and than applied the truths of the Christian on top of that so that the fullness of truth comes to light. Just flat out reading of Jewish interpretation of the OT makes no sense unless one is studying from Christians perspective.

If I reject Christ and convert and become a Jew, how do you imagine it will make me more qualified to understand the Old Testament, from a Christian perspective?