Christianity & Judaism–“One in the Olive Tree!”

I recently read a provocative posting about the conversion of a well known atheistic Jew to Christianity…a criticism of the book bearing the testimony of this faith discovery written by a learned Rabbi, who periodically writes for PJMedia.com.  Within the the lively and unfortunately contentious comments section was the below gem…worth further pondering, in my opinion…

I believe this is an historical symbol used by Jewish believers in Jesus…image is from:

http://www.israeltoday.co.il/NewsItem/tabid/178/nid/29231/Default.aspx

This person’s analysis and perspective on the early genesis (excuse the pun!) of Christianity is well thought out and respectfully presented.  I do not have direct personal knowledge of many of the “facts” presented here but I share this person’s writings so that further dialogue, research, and introspection could follow on from this.

As such, to briefly state my current perspective on this topic, I think the very best version of a faith heritage would (likely) be someone who was raised in the traditional Jewish faith and later on came to the “completed” knowledge of Jesus and their personal Lord. Savior, AND Messiah!  I guess even better would be to be raised in a Messianic Jewish household replete with the beauty of the Historical Traditions of Judaism and the fullness of the knowledge of the completeness of the work of the Cross by our King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  It is truly an extreme historical irony that the early leaders of “The Way”–which later became known as Christianity–argued amongst themselves as to whether or not one had to first become a Jew before becoming a Christian…as in being a Christian (in their minds) actually required someone to be a Jew first.  Now the opposite distortion seems to be in play, in order to accept that Jesus is the (Jewish) Messiah you cannot be a Jew, for such a belief negates your very Jewishness–Wow!

In my personal history there is a loose degree of connection to this topic, at least from a theoretical perspective; my own mother was adopted as an infant and the desire to learn about that unknown heritage was (and continues to be) a key motivating factor in my initial interest in Genealogy (before this pastime’s unique additive tendencies took over!).  It is still my hope that eventually my genealogical endeavors will unearth factual Jewish blood in my background (among many other as yet uncovered inherited enhancements of genetic/cultural/historical/racial/geographical etc facets)…even if I never am blessed with that overt cultural biological heritage.  I am so thankful to have been “grafted” into the vine and to be a child of Abraham, by virtue of Faith, if not also by flesh…

I have on several occasions enjoyed teachings by Messianic Rabbis both on the radio and in person.  The richness of the cultural heritage of the Jews is something many of us raised in the Gentile Christian faith cannot really come close to fathoming.  I’ve even said on a number of occasions that it would be amazing for someone as a believer in Yeshua (Jesus) to be able to be fully immersed in some aspects of Jewish cultural tradition, like Hebrew school.  Having attended a Seder (Passover) event hosted by Messianic Jews I found the experience incredibly faith enriching…especially as the host was unashamed to draw our attention to the clear parallels/foreshadowing of traditional Christian beliefs hidden within so many aspects of this treasured historical and traditional observance.

In an ideal world All believers in the One True God of Abraham, Isaac, & Jacob as well as Moses, David, Solomon, Job, and the Biblical Prophets would recognize the Way, the Truth, and the Life that is available for ALL in Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

So enjoy the comment below…and feel free to check out the original article (at the link below) too…The comment was copied in its entirety with no editing on my part…and please if anyone chooses to comment here on this posting be considerate of others in how your phrase things since this is an obviously complex & controversial topic…

https://pjmedia.com/faith/2016/09/21/andrew-klavans-great-good-thing/?singlepage=true

Dagnabbit_42 Rabbi Zarmi • 19 days ago

Rabbi Zarmi,

Respectfully, one ought not say that “Christianity is based upon the three synoptic gospels.” That is very much like saying that “Judaism is based upon Leviticus.”

Christianity is based upon the teaching given by Jesus to those “apostles” upon whom Jesus conferred authority, divine assistance, and an explicit mission, to:

1. spread his teaching; and,
2. welcome persons of every nation and tribe into his “kingdom”

To “The Twelve” (with a companion named Matthias replacing Judas Iscariot who betrayed him after the latter died), Jesus promised divine assistance, such that “what [they] bound on earth was bound in heaven, and what they loosed on earth was loosed in heaven.”

He also gave them a liturgical act to be performed as a kind of Temple service parallel to that of priests serving in the Temple. The early Jewish Christians called it the todah or Thanksgiving Offering; the later Greek Christians translated this as “Eucharist.” This act was, all at once, supposed to be Jesus’ reworking of the pascha and a todah and even the korbanot ofYom Kippur and Sukkot, remodeled into a single sacrifice in which the death of Jesus himself was to be endlessly re-encountered through the ages “in an unbloody way.”

In creating this liturgical act, Jesus washed the feet of Simon Peter and the others that they might “have a share in [him],” after the fashion of the Levites whose “share” is G_d. And Jesus commanded them to do this sacrifice “in remembrance” (Gk: anamnesis; Hb: azkarah/zikkaron). In this way Jesus intended to culminate all the sacrificial life of Israel in himself, and to make it the center of the life of the Messianic Kingdom.

Furthermore, although Jesus claimed that he came for “the lost sheep of Israel” (not, mind you, merely Judah; but all Israel), he then told his authorized teachers (the Twelve and the Seventy Two) that he had made them judges in his expanding “tribe of G_d” and royal stewards for his “kingdom of G_d” and told them: “Go into all the world making disciples of all the nations, teaching them whatever I have commanded you, and baptizing them” — the latter being his selected “adoption rite” for entering the covenant people of G_d, parallel to circumcision for the Jew.

Now, none of that involved writing anything down.

Christians call the body of teaching which Jesus gave to those whom he sent out (“apostles”) the “Apostolic Deposit of Faith.”

The 27 books which early Christians called “the memoirs of the apostles” and modern Christians call “the New Testament” are, for Christians, writings which bear witness to the life of Jesus and the initial giving of the Apostolic Deposit of Faith.

I apologize for the length of this (I’m almost done!).

I offer you this clarifying information, Rabbi Zarmi, because I think you and I have corresponded previously here in the comboxes on PJmedia, and I remember you as someone willing to make an effort to not mis-characterize things.

For Christians, Christianity is the Apostolic Deposit of Faith. When Christians divide amongst themselves and disagree on religious matters it is because one group is asking, “Is Doctrine XYZ really part of the deposit of faith?” and another is saying, “Yes” and then the two are disagreeing about who, if anyone, has authority to say that it is or isn’t.

Serious, “orthodox” Christians all hold that Paul of Tarsus and Matthew and Luke and John and James and Peter were allteaching exactly the same deposit, whether by spoken witness or in writing. But all their writings differ in flavor because they were written…
(a.) by different persons,
(b.) in different genres,
(c.) for different audiences,
(d.) to address different needs and topics.

Therefore, it would be an error to (for example) hold that John’s gospel was teaching a different thing from those of Matthew, Mark or Luke; or that Paul’s writings teach a different thing from the gospels; or that the letter of James represented some kind of contrary teaching to Paul.

And consequently one can’t really say Christianity is “based on” a subset of these books, or even all of them together. For the Christian, those books are “based on” the person of Jesus and the teaching he wanted transmitted.

I think the dialogue between Rabbi Jacob Neusner and the Catholic Josef Ratzinger who became Pope (now Pope Emeritus) Benedict XVI is the most instructive on this topic.

See: http://chiesa.espresso.repubbl…

Hopefully I”ll be able to locate the lyrics and music to a very appropriate song…

Jew and Gentile
by Joel Chernoff

Album: The Restoration of Israel
by Joel Chernoff

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Jew and Gentile, one in Messiah,
One in Yeshua, one in the olive tree.
Jew and Gentile, one in Messiah,
One in Yeshua’s love.

Help us Father, to love one another,
With humble hearts, Forgiving each other,
Heal our wounds, bind us together,
So the world might believe.

One in Yeshua’s love,
One in Yeshua’s love,
One in Yeshua’s love,
Sing it all together.

These lyrics are from this site (we have this song on a CD “The Road to Jerusalem”):

http://www.invubu.com/music/show/song/Joel-Chernoff/Jew-and-Gentile.html

and this should lead to the music on youtube, hopefully…Enjoy!