Messianic Judaism

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Help! I have run into a very nasty, anti-Catholic, anti-Christian Messianic Jewish couple. I am stunned by their vitriol – they consider anyone who does not celebrate the Jewish feast days heretical. They believe that if we do not use Christ’s Hebrew name, Y’shua, then we are not “calling on His name.” They consider all other forms of Christianity (not just Catholic) to be heretical. They talk about being “under the law” and so forth.

I am lost! Obviously, I have no hope of evanglizing these people because we cannot even establish relationship. Do you have any suggestions for dealing with these folks?

Thanks in advance,

SouthernSister
 
I believe we have instructions on what to do:

**Matthew 10:14
**

14If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town.
 
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SouthernSister:
Help! I have run into a very nasty, anti-Catholic, anti-Christian Messianic Jewish couple. I am stunned by their vitriol – they consider anyone who does not celebrate the Jewish feast days heretical. They believe that if we do not use Christ’s Hebrew name, Y’shua, then we are not “calling on His name.” They consider all other forms of Christianity (not just Catholic) to be heretical. They talk about being “under the law” and so forth.

I am lost! Obviously, I have no hope of evanglizing these people because we cannot even establish relationship. Do you have any suggestions for dealing with these folks?

Thanks in advance,

SouthernSister
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Well, to get to the idea that we are still “under the law” they must ignore large portions of the New Testament-- basically anything written by St. Paul.

But I digress…

I would not continue any relationship with these people.
 
St. Paul’s letter to the Romans might give you some ideas, especially chapter 2-5, where he talks about Abraham being justified by faith apart from any works of the Mosaic law.
 
This seems rather odd as Messianic Judaism is just another protestant denomination.

They are protestant Christians that keep some of the trappings of Judaism.

How can one be a Messianic Jew yet be anti-christian?
 
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SouthernSister:
Help! I have run into a very nasty, anti-Catholic, anti-Christian Messianic Jewish couple. I am stunned by their vitriol – they consider anyone who does not celebrate the Jewish feast days heretical. They believe that if we do not use Christ’s Hebrew name, Y’shua, then we are not “calling on His name.” They consider all other forms of Christianity (not just Catholic) to be heretical. They talk about being “under the law” and so forth.

I am lost! Obviously, I have no hope of evanglizing these people because we cannot even establish relationship. Do you have any suggestions for dealing with these folks?

Thanks in advance,

SouthernSister
Click to expand...
Congratulations! You just ran right head on into members of the Sacred Name cult and that site should give you a better understanding of what they are all about. Most are (as you saw) pretty nasty about anyone not their cult and most especially we Catholics. I have found that they are generally so vitriolic and irrational that you can’t even talk to them. Better to just walk away… (and I don’t do that very often).
Pax tecum,
 
Happy Thanksgiving to All ! 👋

Messianic Judaism website:

mjaa.org/engine.cfm?i=3&sl=18

A brief explanation of same.

I had to use the scroll down function, to read the
remaining few paragraphs, which cover
the idea of keeping the Mosaic Law…

reen12
 
I would have to agree with Church Militant’s assessment. There are some who believe that one must know the sacred names Yahweh and Yeshua (different spellings which they do not even agree upon) for one to be saved. In the non-Catholic community they are seen as a cult. It borders on Gnosticism in my opinion. Please do not assert that all Messianic’s are this rabid. There are some great teachings from the Messianic’s that I have read. As I read up on Catholicism things become more clearer.

If you want to hold a conversation with them be an attentive listener. Hold conversations on what you know from the teachings of Catholicism. For example baptism. Be assertive and kind but hold firm to your faith. If they refuse to listen and consider what you are saying then shake the dust off of your feet. Plant the seeds and let the Holy Spirit begin his work.

As one of the great Bishops have said (sorry the name escapes me and the exact quote as well) borders on people hate Catholicism because of what they believe the Catholic Church teaches.

🙂 Melissa
 
“Few people in America hate the Catholic religion, but there are many who hate what they mistakenly believe is the Catholic religion—and if what they hate really were the Catholic religion, Catholics would hate it too.”
Bishop Fulton Sheen
 
I look at it this way:

If a person told me that they were a “practicing”
Catholic, I would not assume that they
necessarily understood the stated position
of the Church, on a given theological issue.
They may or may not.

That’s why I posted a link - to website started
by Messianic Jews…so Messianic Jews could speak for
themselves, on the subject of what they hold.

mjaa.org/engine.cfm?i=3&sl=18

reen
 
I have belonged for a while to a couple of forums of said ‘religion’ of Messianic Judaism. I have never encountered the possibility of a secret name for Yeshua but from what I can ascertain, the religion is a bastardization of Judaism and Christianity as a whole.

And then I encountered Catholic Answers! 😃
 
Dear Shoshana,

When I read your post, it occurred to me that
the Kabbalah might involve secret names for
God.
So, I looked it up on Google, under:

Kabbalah secret name for God
and came up with:

kheper.net/topics/Kabbalah/Name/1.htm

Apparently, the idea of secret names for God
didn’t start with Messianic Jews.

My knowledge, concerning the Kabbalah, is
almost less than nothing, still, the reference
to a ‘secret name’ somehow rang a bell, in
my memory.

Best, :tiphat:

reen
 
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reen12:
Dear Shoshana,

When I read your post, it occurred to me that
the Kabbalah might involve secret names for
God.
So, I looked it up on Google, under:

Kabbalah secret name for God
and came up with:

kheper.net/topics/Kabbalah/Name/1.htm

Apparently, the idea of secret names for God
didn’t start with Messianic Jews.

My knowledge, concerning the Kabbalah, is
almost less than nothing, still, the reference
to a ‘secret name’ somehow rang a bell, in
my memory.

Best, :tiphat:

reen
Click to expand...
Code:
You are right, Reen! Kabbalah has turned into a cult for a while but Soloviev saw great mysticism in it many years ago. Like everything else, things get bastardized and we probably have lost a pearl of great price in the process! Thank you my friend!
 
Hi, Shoshana!

You’re welcome! :tiphat:

While you were posting, I was checking out this
webpage:

jewfaq.org/kabbalah.htm

It gives a brief overview of Kabbalah.
{I thought it was:* the* Kabbalah,
but, evidently, it’s referred to as,
simply, Kabbalah.}

You undoubtedly know a lot more on
the subject than I,:yup: but I wanted to share
this webpage.

Kindest regards,

reen
 
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1ke:
Well, to get to the idea that we are still “under the law” they must ignore large portions of the New Testament-- basically anything written by St. Paul.

But I digress…

I would not continue any relationship with these people.
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I agree, Ke. Also, quoting St. Paul to them would probably be of no avail since, as I’ve discovered through some online contact “Messianic Jews”, they don’t think much of St. Paul precisely because of his condemnation of those who clung to the Law.
 
I googled it and found a webpage which has a Catholic nun responding to a question about Messianic Jews. You can see the question and answer here.

A small part of her answer is this:

All of this raises questions for your friends, I think. Some that occur to me include:
  1. Do we read Acts 15 fundamentalistically as a “proof text” or do we read it (and the rest of Acts) in an historical-critical manner, attending to the historical context and the work of Paul as well?
  2. Do we allow a proof text reading of Acts 15 to undercut Paul’s developed theology of the Law vs Gospel, new covenant vs old, new aeon, vs old, mature faith vs tutelage of the Law, etc?
  3. Should “messianic Jews” risk bringing the kind of diviseness put to death on the cross or should they be allowed to act rather like the party of judaizers did in the chuch is Galatia. (Even if this is unintentional, the praxis of refraining from certain foods brings others into some of the same conditions which occured for Paul, including reminding us of Peter’s scandalous refusal to eat with Gentiles who were not obeying the food restrictions of the Torah, and demanding we comes to terms with the radicality of Paul’s theology of the Christ Event.) Harrington remarks that, “Therefore in Paul’s view, those who follow the Law rather than Christ are on the worng path, and in a sort of theological limbo.” Paul and the Mystery of Israel, p. 81.
  4. Is Christ REALLY the end (telos) of the Law or not? Are those of us who are baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection empowered to keep the whole of the Law without reference to the Mosiac Law, or are we still under the tutelage of the Law of Moses? It really is a case of either or here. To step back and forth is to step back and forth between maturity and childhood, freedom from sin and the world or era of sin. Are Christians really part of the newly defined Israel, or are they really not as privileged? Are “messianic Jews” more or less a part of Christ that they need to continue to observe a Law Christ nailed to the cross?
  5. Do we really need signs of ritual purity? Signs of being set apart (aside from the cross which both sets apart in a new sense and opens us to the company of sinners, the godless, etc as Law in particular CANNOT do? (I would suggest that keeping kosher, etc, serves as a bar to precisely this kind of universal fellowship practived by Jesus, Paul, etc. Again, Peter’s readoption of the constraints of the Law in this area ar very telling. Can your friends simply sit down and eat a meal anywhere with anyone? This is a central part of what it means to be a Chirstian since all meals are ritual realities and since Christ destroyed any barrier between sacred and profane. We are called to be Christ for others in precisely this way.)
  6. What would your friends conclude about Peter’s behavior (refusing to eat with Paul’s community of Gentiles) or of Paul’s (demanding universal commensality and taking Peter to task for his hypocrisy)? Would Paul be a “adequate” “messianic Jew”? What about other Jews (including those in ANY day) who dropped the ritual food requirements they subscribe to still?
 
The most interesting thing about Messianics, to me, is their claim that they were the first group of believers. (Many do not like the term “Christian.”)

The truth is that they started in the 1960s by Baptists of Jewish descent who wanted to follow Mosaic law - completely missing the point of Romans.

If they really preexisted any Christian Church, then they would be undoubtedly using the deuterocanon. The Jews expunged the Deutero from their OT around 90 AD. So, if the Messianics claim is true, they should have 73 books in their Bible. They do not. They have the incomplete Protestant Bible.

That said, I have 2 good friends who are Messianic Jews, who are some of the nicest and most God-loving people I know.
 
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ByzCath:
This seems rather odd as Messianic Judaism is just another protestant denomination.

They are protestant Christians that keep some of the trappings of Judaism.

How can one be a Messianic Jew yet be anti-christian?
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Thanks for all the answers to my post! And yes, this is my question too: how can one be a Messianic Jew yet be anti-Christian?! I’ve wondered the same thing. They are anti-any-other-Christian-but-Messianic-Jew people. They’ve changed their names and everything! For some odd reason, they seem to believe that “pure” belief in Y’shua as Messiah has been highjacked by gentile Christians.

SouthernSister
 
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SouthernSister:
Thanks for all the answers to my post! And yes, this is my question too: how can one be a Messianic Jew yet be anti-Christian?! I’ve wondered the same thing. They are anti-any-other-Christian-but-Messianic-Jew people. They’ve changed their names and everything! For some odd reason, they seem to believe that “pure” belief in Y’shua as Messiah has been highjacked by gentile Christians.

SouthernSister
Click to expand...
They basically believe that any gentile influence in the early church was evil… and “Christianity” started with the Greek and Latin Fathers and was apostate from the beginning. Then Constantine sealed the deal, making the Church “Roman.”

In this respect they are even more extreme than many antiCatholics, who will acknowledge a pre-325 AD “biblical church.” Messianics think they were off by themselves before Polycarp and Ignatius!

So, they associate the word “Christian” with “apostate.”

Yet, we find no trace of them pre-1960s…
 
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