I'm a Noachide, so you might see my take that The One God revealed Himself to the Hebrews at Sinai.
I see Jesus legacy as having opened the scientific revolution of the Renaissance, and without which the United States could not have been founded.
On the other hand, I suspect Jesus the Jew would have been appalled to see what Paul and the Gospel writers had turned him into.
I think Jews becoming Christian is fine so long as when they choose Christianity they leave Judaism to Jews. Conversely a Christian who became a Jew, yet still called himself a Christian would be disingenuous at best, and likely could be considered deeply sinful.
I just don’t understand how one can be one thing yet insist on being called what that thing clearly is not. It strikes me as somewhat infantile that one cannot stand with one’s convictions, and rather attempt to have it both ways. That seems like moral relativism to me.
”If I knew God I’d be Him.” Though I think singleness of purpose overall is an attribute of which He’d approve.
God’s grace to You and Yours.
Onedoug,
Your statement; “I think Jews becoming Christian is fine so long as when they choose Christianity they leave Judaism to Jews”. indicates your lack of understanding of the roots of Christianity.
Those Jews in Messiah are called to freedom and are not bound to Torah. Yet, Messianic Jews are free to observe Jewish holidays and festivals. We have our own “Messianic Distinctive”.
The Messiah does not desire that Jewish believers be stripped of their Jewish identity.
In fact, when Messiah Yeshus (Jesus) returns to reign in Jerusalem, all the nations of the earth will be commanded to celebrate Succoth (The Feast of Tabernacles). See the passage below.
Zechariah 14:16-19 (New International Version)
16 Then the survivors from all the nations that have attacked Jerusalem will go up year after year to worship the King, the LORD Almighty, and to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles. 17 If any of the peoples of the earth do not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD Almighty, they will have no rain. 18
I cited this passage to give you a better understanding of the things to come. Much of the form of Christianity in the Church Age will pass away. I do not believe that the Law will be re-instituted, but rather a world free in G-d’s grace will exist. It is then that both Israel and the nations will reach the perfection that G-d has intended.
Zechariah 2:10 “Shout and be glad, O Daughter of Zion. For I am coming, and I will live among you,” declares the LORD. “Many nations will be joined with the LORD in that day and will become my people. I will live among you and you will know that the LORD Almighty has sent me to you.
The fault wasn't with Paul or the other Apostles, but with later Christian interpretation of them, which went from their intent of handling Gentile converts essentially as Noachides to rejecting the Jewish part of the faith. If you can get a hold of a copy, read Paul and Rabbinic Judaism by E.W. Davies, or, for a Conservative (non-Messianic) Jewish perspective, Mark Nanos' commentaries on Romans and Galatians.
Paul was an Orthodox Jew who would be appalled at what people had made of his writings.
Shalom!