Jews regard “Messianic Jews” (who are not Jews in any sense of the word) as a) a fraud; and b) hostile, aggressive attempts at conversion through deceit.
They are simply obeying the “great commission”.
Until now I have avoided threads like this one, but I have seen a few of them lately and I wonder if someone has a mission of separating Jewish and Christian conservatives from one-another.
Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people. It is not just a geographic area; it is the place that the Jewish Bible identifies as the home of the Jews’ Temple in Jerusalem, the land where certain laws relating to the land are followed (and they do not apply anywhere else in the world). The Five Books of Moses tell the story of the Jews being sent by G-d to Israel, the promised land. The prophets and the other writings (by and large discuss the penalties imposed on the Jews for misbehavior in the land of Israel.
Since the expulsion of the Jews by the Romans following the Bar Kokhba rebellion about 70 years after the Second Temple was destroyed, Jews have longed to be back in Israel. The cry of “Next Year in Jerusalem” was said at the end of the Passover seder; Jews would leave a little bit of their homes unfinished in commemoration of the destruction of the Temple; at Jewish weddings the Groom breaks a glass under his foot just when he is married in order to commemorate that destruction.
Hatikva, the national anthem of the Jewish State of Israel, expresses the hope (that is what HaTikva means) that the Jews can be a free people in their land).
Jews do not begrudge a Christian presence in Israel. To the contrary, they are welcomed. The Christian sites, including monasteries, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and others, are visited by millions of Christian pilgrims every year. In 2018 alone, some 25 million tourists visited Israel, and most of them are not Jews.
All the Jews ask is that Christians not try to convert Jews by subterfuge. Pretending to be Jews, approaching uninformed Jews to convince them that they can be both Jews and Christians, inviting them to Christian prayer meetings without calling them Christian — all of this is a sly, underhanded way to insinuate their religion into the body politic of the Jewish people.
In my opinion, it is unethical to do this, and the consequence is that it makes Jews distrustful of Christians and makes Christians resentful of Jews. It is time for this to stop. We have so much more in common than what divides us. Sneaky efforts like these destroy those common bonds.
Messianic Jews are Christians. And their practice is to fool Jews to think they are NOT CHRISTIANS. Their mission is to convert JEWS to CHRISTIANITY. Jews consider this dishonest and unethical.
Jews do not consider Jesus a prophet, as do Muslims. They do not consider Jesus the Son of Gd and Savior and the Messiah as Christians do.
If you consider Jesus the Messiah you are BY DEFINITION a Christian. Nothing wrong with it: own it and be honest.
Dishonesty, trickery, and deceptively converting people to Christianity is wrong.
Ping.
So why mention it, assuming any of it is even true?
(Do any non-Christian sources report any of this?)
ML/NJ
I’ve been through many of these arguments. The bottom line is that many Christians think that it is perfectly appropriate for them to dictate what Judaism is and who is Jewish. Not only that, but they have no compunction about telling you your religion is wrong and you are only OK if you accept the Christian messiah. So, if some Christians calling themselves Jews want to engage deceptively in Christian Missionary activities, there’s nothing wrong with that.
It is a given that each person of faith thinks they have the right one and everyone else is wrong. Fine. But here on FR, I have always expected that we will do each other the mutual courtesy of not invalidating each other’s beliefs. As this thread shows, things quickly descend into pretty ugly places when that happens.
So, to all my friends, I won’t insult your religion and I hope you will not insult mine.
A Jew is someone born to a Jewish mother or converted to Judaism by Jewish law. A born Jew who adopts Christianity need not reconvert to Judaism when he returns, but it should be no surprise that one who professes another religion will in most respects be treated as a non-Jew.
Anyone who is identifiably Jewish should bear in mind that no matter how Christian one becomes, he will not escape the inevitable persecution for being Jewish when it comes.
A Jew is actually someone who has a Jewish soul, and many non-Jews can subconsciously feel the presence of that Jewish soul.
If you believe people are living or dead because of gods will, why do you want to thwart or change Gods will ?
I wonder who gets more hate from religious Jews: a Jew who decides to follow Jesus? Or a Jew who decides to follow Marx?
Was not the faith and Commandments soteriology nullified by Calvary?
I am pretty sure the Got mit uns (God is with us) was sported by the Wehrmacht, while the SS had Meine Ehre heißt Treue (’My honour is loyalty’)
My experience with chrstians on this forum is that they simply assume that chrstianity is true. They don't really have a reason, or even need a reason. It's simply true because it must be true; it's not being true is simply unthinkable.
I can't believe I used to think like this myself.