Why Are These Korean Christians Keeping Shabbat?

Thirty-five Korean ministers and professors visited the Los Angeles Jewish community last week, sitting in on high school Torah classes, attending morning prayers, joining a Shabbat meal and studying Jewish texts with local rabbis.

All devout Christians, these students of Judaism hailed not only from South Korea, but also from Korean communities in Russia, China, South America, Canada and across the United States.

They were not interested in converting to Judaism or in proselytizing Jews, but rather were here to learn the secret to Judaism’s survival.

“Jews successfully conveyed the Torah, the traditions, the history — especially the history of suffering — and the family values based on Torah for 3,000 years with no generation gaps,” said the group’s leader, Yongsoo Hyun. “The Christian people lost the value of how to raise children who are holy.

Hyun, 62, a Presbyterian minister and professor who moved to the United States in 1975, has spent the last 18 years studying the Jewish community and spreading his Jewish gospel from his Mar Vista-based Shema Education Institute.

This is the ninth annual tour of Los Angeles Hyun has led, the culminating event of a three-semester course attended by 400 students each year at locations around the world. Hyun says 3,000 Koreans have graduated his class, paying $350 a semester, and he believes about 3 million people have been affected by his teachings through seminars led by his disciples or by reading one of his 22 books on Judaism, which have sold hundreds of thousands of copies in South Korea.

Hyun focuses on family, jumping off the biblical idea of keeping three generations together — as in Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, or the Torah’s refrain of “you and your children and your children’s children.”

But some Jews might not recognize the Judaism Hyun teaches. He speaks of a Judaism with intact families and no faulty transmission lines between parent and child. He speaks of Jewish Nobel laureates gaining their wisdom through Jewish studies, though most did not have a Jewish education.

His understanding of Judaism derives almost exclusively from observance of Orthodox families and studying with traditional rabbis. He believes the father is primarily responsible for transmitting texts and traditions to children, with the mother being responsible for the family’s emotional well-being and helping the father.

“I don’t get high grades in modern feminist literature, but I don’t think this division of labor is clear cut. Both parents contribute appreciably to both the intellectual and the emotional training of their children,” said Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein, who has been Hyun’s mentor. “It is partially Dr. Hyun’s reaction coming from a very man-centered society, where these divisions of labor still exist, and he thinks he spots them in traditional Judaism, but I don’t see them in my home or in my community.”

Adlerstein, a professor of Jewish law and ethics at Loyola Law School, said Hyun is as loyal a friend as the Jewish community and Israel will find, as well as a personal friend. Hyun pursues Jewish knowledge assiduously, and he knows more about Jewish texts and traditions than most Jews.

The visitors to Los Angeles, many of whom brought their families, toured the Museum of Tolerance, Beth Jacob Congregation in Beverly Hills, the Skirball Cultural Center, American Jewish University and YULA Boys High School and went on a shopping spree at 613 The Mitzvah Store before participating in a commencement ceremony at the JJ Grand Hotel in Koreatown at the end of their weeklong stay. Koreans often compare themselves to Jews — a beleaguered people from a small country surrounded by enemies, which is, like ancient Israel, divided in two. Their brothers in North Korea are persecuted, while millions of Koreans in the Diaspora — and even those in the increasingly westernized South Korea — struggle to maintain their traditions and a standard of excellence for their children.

Hyun’s interest in Judaism began in 1990 while working toward his Ph.D. in education at Biola University, a Christian school in Orange County. As part of his studies, he was moved by what he saw as the God-centered nature of Jewish education, compared to the student-centered nature of classical American education.

He started taking classes at the University of Judaism (now American Jewish University), but was turned off by the liberal approach he found there. He switched to Yeshiva University of Los Angeles and, after some persistent nudging, ended up talking with Adlerstein, who was teaching there at the time.

Adlerstein, currently director of interfaith affairs at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, invited Hyun to his home for Shabbat dinner. Now Hyun and his wife — and often dozens of Hyun’s guests — regularly attend Adlerstein’s Passover, Rosh Hashanah and Shabbat meals. Hyun set up the Shema Education Institute in 1992, and has since become something of a cult figure among his followers in South Korea and in the Korean Diaspora.

“We have had great leaders like Moses, and Paul in the New Testament, and Dr. Hyun’s discovery of the secret of Jewish survival is one of the greatest discoveries in human history,” said Yeong Pog Kim, with Hyun translating.

Kim has 2,000 members at his Presbyterian Church of Love and Peace near Seoul, and he said he is slowly introducing them to Jewish family values and educational methods.

He believes the Jewish give and take between teacher and student can revolutionize staid Korean classrooms. And it will make families stronger, as husbands learn to respect their wives and spend more time with their children.

Like many of Hyun’s students, Chi Nam Kim, a pastor in Toronto, has modified how he observes the Lord’s Day. Now, his wife lights candles every Sunday, and he says a prayer over the wine and the bread, and blesses his children and wife, all dressed in their best traditional clothes.

Chi Nam Kim explains this commitment by quoting Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel’s observation, “More than the Jews have kept the Sabbath, the Sabbath has kept the Jews.”

One student, Jin Sup Kim, prays three times a day, reciting the Shema and the biblical chapters that come after it, along with verses from the New Testament.

Jin Sup Kim is vice president of the divinity college at Baekseok University, a Christian school near Seoul with 30,000 students. Kim earned a Ph.D. in ancient near eastern studies at Philadelphia’s Dropsie College, now known as the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Kim, who teaches Hebrew, named his children Salome, Emet and Chesed, Hebrew words for peace, truth and kindness. During summer and winter breaks, he studies the Bible with his children for hours every day and encourages his 950 divinity students to do the same. Kim leads a division of the Shema Education Institute and his own organization, the Korean Diaspora Revival Foundation, with offices in Israel aimed at drumming up Korean support for Israel and Judaism. Addressing the anti-Semitism some Christian missionaries imported into Korea has been a clear benefit of the program.

“I didn’t like the Jewish people because of what they did to Jesus and Paul in the New Testament,” said Yeong Pog Kim, the minister from Seoul. “But now I turned to being pro-Israel. Now it opened my eyes to see the Jews positively, as a friend, and to see the Old Testament with a positive mind.”

In the past decade, South Korea has sent more tourists — mostly Christian pilgrims — to Israel than the rest of Asia combined, and the political relationship between the two countries continues to improve, according to the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. While Israel needs that kind of international support, and the attention the Shema Education Institute is offering the L.A. Jewish community is flattering, is this attention all positive?

Adlerstein isn’t so worried about the Koreans’ filtered interpretations of Judaism — they are, after all, not planning to become Jewish. But Adlerstein does worry about what some refer to as reverse anti-Semitism, something he has seen in many parts of the world. “Putting Jews up on a pedestal for how they are educated or for their achievements is sort of nice, but at the same time, it sends the message that the reason why we like Jews or will tolerate them is because they act on a higher plane. And we don’t always act on a higher plane, and these positive stereotypes are not always true,” Adlerstein said. “We would rather be accepted because we are a people and all people deserve tolerance and acceptance.”

“As a traditional Jew, I can’t fight it too much because I do believe it is what the Ribbono Shel Olam [Master of the Universe] asks of us. He does ask of us to live on a higher plane, to be an or lagoyim [a light unto the nations].

I find this insistence in some people who are not anti-Semites, but who insist on Jews being different, to be disturbing and exhilarating at the same time.”

Why? Because the dominant form of Christianity in Korea is a sort of protestantism that is readily susceptible to Judasizing heresies, the sort that wants to ignore the fact that we are the “wild olive branch” and pretend that our forebearers were Jews, not pagans, and mistakenly regards the Masorete as the ur-text for the Old Covenant Scriptures even though the Church from the beginning used the Septuagint (LXX), the Dead Sea Scrolls much more often support the LXX over the Masorete when the texts differ, and the oldest extant copies of the LXX are 2nd century, while the oldest extant copies of the Masorete are 10th century.

We Orthodox Christian have hymns praising Christ and the Theotokos for “free[ing] us from the delusion of idols”, even though the number of generations from us back to the pagans are now many more than would be the case for Korean protestants, whom I suspect have no such hymns.

Why keep the Sabbath instead of Sunday? Its the right thing to do. Indeed this vital question was addressed in research from the Vatican’s own archives by the late Dr. Samuele Bacchiocchi. He was enrolled in the Ph.D. program at the Pontifical Gregorian University for which he was awarded a gold medal by Pope Paul VI. This research became the basis for his book, From Sabbath to Sunday.

Based on the Vatican’s own documentation, Bacchiocchi shows that it was the Roman Church that changed Christian observance of a Saturday Sabbath to Sunday. The primary reason it was done was to distance the Church from the Jews and to show the authority of the Roman Church.

see:
http://www.biblicalperspectives.com/books/sabbath_to_sunday/

IMHO Who as a Christian believes we are in the *Last Days*

Maybe it’s just testimony that Judiasm is the religion that GOD gave human beings in accepting Monotheism. Now here we are with the issue of *Jesus Christ* Many Jews who still don’t believe he is the Promised Messiah, and many Christians and Christian denominations that embrace him as the Jewish Messiah, Saviour of the World.

I think when Jesus returns in the 2nd Coming, Jews will finally realize who he is and Christians will realize most of our beliefs in Organized Christians will cease, and Judiasm will still be the religion of the earth.

That is just my opinion based on my faith and research of religions.

That's an amazing number of errors to fit into one sentence. Just to start with, if the frequent quotation of the LXX to a Greek audience is proof that it is more inspired than the original Hebrew, then the frequent quotation of the KJV to English audiences must prove that it is superior to the LXX, right?

Shalom.

It’s not a “Judaising heresy” as long as one does not consider the following the Law necessary for salvation.

The specific “Judaizers” discussed by Paul and others were Jews who required gentile Chrisitians to effectively convert to Judaism and taught actions were necessary for salvation.

There is a very great distiction between salavation and “living a fine, upstanding, life for the Glory of God,” which the Law is a helpful tool in doing.

You pretty much can’t go wrong, on day-to-day life, following the 613 mitzvah (that apply to life today).

I’ve gone through the list myself and added several to my life to help me keep God at the center of my life.

“Why would or should anyone care? Faith in Christ and God are the keys to redemption, not belief in the specific teachings of one or another denomination.”

From what I got out of the article, it was how do we keep our faith alive and strong and passed on to our kids and grandkids. Especially in times of persecution. (I added that part).

I would think another good study into that would be of the Chinese Christians. After the missionaries were kicked out they were then allowed back in after years and years (30, 40 years?). They had hoped to find some remnants of the seeds they had planted before they were forced to leave and the churches destroyed. Instead, the Christion community was HUGE in China when they returned (underground churches).

The missionary I heard said “the Chinese Christians are praying for Americans to be persecuted so that their faith in Christ will grow.” After the talk I thanked the guy, “but can you ask your friends in China to quit praying for us?!”

Well for one, many of the Christian Denominations are loosing flocks out of their congreagations. Judaism has really never lost out, in all the persecutions the Jews suffered, they still remain steadfast in there faith.

Yes Christ in *Key* in redemption, but does that mean when Jesus returns all religious faith and worship will to?

I think some of the Jewish Festivals and Sabbbath will still be in place when Jesus reins on earth.

Learn a bit about the history of the text of Scripture and how it actually was fixed by the Church and get back to me. Everything I said is true. Find an older extant copy of the Masorete if you can, or point to enough instances to support a counter-claim to the Dead Sea Scrolls supporting the LXX over the Masorete in more instances (there are, of course a few where it’s the other way, and some where the three texts all disagree).

The LXX is the Old Covenant Scriptures as received by the Church. The Masorete is the Old Covenant Scriptures as redacted by Christ-denying rabbis.

If you’re a Jew and don’t think Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ, then by all means prefer the Masorete. If, on the other hand you are a Christian, the preference for the Masorete found among protestants should mystify you.

Your belief of what the final coming will bring is yours and you are welcome to it. All of those who led good lives from before Christ to the present will be accepted by God regardless of their particular belief. That is what I believe. Many feel they have the right, because of what their denomination teaches them, to judge others which I believe is in God’s domain not man’s. If Christian denominations are losing members then that speaks to their ability to inspire and keep their flocks through their message, not and not to competition. I also have never understood why some denominations feel the need to compete for believers; the message should be what attracts the believers.

Learn a bit about the history of the text of Scripture and how it actually was fixed by the Church and get back to me.

Learn a bit about the history of the text of Scripture, and how the first 80% was fixed by the Jewish people long before there was a Church, and then get back to me.

You might also note that I don't argue for the Masoretic, but for the Hebrew. I can accept that there have been a handful of minor scribal errors transmitted in the MT, pretty much all of which turn up in the DSS. I also accept that the Masoretic dagesh (vowel) marks are not inspired--the rabbis spend plenty of time playing with different ways to arrange the vowels.

But for someone to be so foolish and ignorant as to claim that a group of translators (worthy men though they indeed were) who lived in a time that the books of Maccabees outright state that there were no prophets alive (1Mac. 4:46, 9:27, 14:41) are somehow more inspired than the original Hebrew words that the Holy One Himself gave to Moses "mouth to mouth" (Num. 12:8) is an testament to the incredible native arrogance of the Greeks.

Shalom.

And the Jews translated it into Greek before the coming of Christ without the anti-Christian biases of the Masoretic redaction. The Hebrew text used in Palestine at the time of Our Lord’s earthly ministry was rejected by the Jews in favor of a Babylonian text.

Get over it, there is not Hebrew ur-text to go back to. The Dead Sea Scrolls predate the Masorete, and are in Hebrew, but if go with their version, you end up mostly agreeing with the LXX, not the Masorete.

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