Spiritual Aliyah

Every year around this time I leave behind the laptop computer and my myriad projects to welcome the Mediterranean shores of the land of my heart and soul. This year, my annual Israel pilgrimage takes wings on Thursday, November 29. I will be in Netanya by Friday night, November 30.

As I write, Israel is planning a large-scale military operation in Gaza, the nation is run by a man who buys into failed liberal notions of appeasing Israel’s enemies, and there are concerns about the future of Jerusalem. Still, for Israel this is relative peace. The security fence, much hated by liberals worldwide for depriving Palestinians of a view of the horizon, has made suicide bombings rare.

But it is not politics that draws me to this place. It is a sense that this land is the place of the World to Come and the days of Messiah. Mark Twain famously commented in his time about the appalling wretchedness of the land. In his day it was largely infested with swamps and unused land. It was a sparsely populated no man’s land.

In the same way, even with decades of progress, I see the squalor of the land in contrast to its future promise. Sure, Jerusalem is greatly enlarged and quite beautiful as the sun rises and sets on its golden stones. And the swamps are drained and the fields swell with produce. They even grow tomatoes in the desert now!

Yet I see so much more in Israel’s future than the progress that has been made. The desert will bloom. Mt Zion will become chief of the mountains. The temple will stand once again. Jerusalem will be called the throne of HaShem.

So I go and I look out over the plain of Megiddo, and I see potential. I take in the panoramo of the Judean hills and I see them dripping with sweet wine someday. I stand on the Mt of Olives and I picture him coming down, Zechariah 14 style, to split that mount and rescue the ones suffering in Jerusalem. I stand on the Muslim temple mount, forbidden to pray by the law of the Wakf, which the liberal government allows to rule there, and I see a glorious temple in place of that gaudy 7th century dome which imitates Byzantine style.

This year, I will be bringing my Blackberry. I will be writing some travel notes. I will be texting my thumbs off, sending notes home for you who read this blog.

I hope you will check in and read, starting daily on December 1. I hope you will make a spiritual aliyah with me.

Musings on the Amidah, Part 3

The cruel God. The harsh judge. The unfeeling absolute.

I can’t say I blame most people for thinking of God this way. We experience the world as a cruel place. Senseless tragedies occur every day. Corruption surrounds us. All things fail us and all people.

God is the Creator, we believe. He is the Master with power over all this madness we call life.

Christopher Hitchens has put it eloquently in his book God is Not Great:

There is a central paradox at the core of all religion. The three great monotheisms teach people to think abjectly of themselves, as miserable and guilty sinners prostrate before an angry and jealous God who, according to their discrepant accounts, fashioned them either out of dust and clay or a clot of blood. The positions for prayer are usually emulations of the suppliant serf before an ill-tempered monarch. The message is one of continual submission, gratitude, and fear. Life itself is a poor thing: an interval in which to prepare for the hereafter or the coming – or second coming – of the Messiah. (p.73).

It’s not a pretty picture, is it?Where can we find a reason for the hope that lies in us? Where can we find not proof but hope?

Rumor has it that the power of God should not be a source of comfort to us in this. The philosophical “problem of evil” is a problem because God is powerful and yet does not stop evil. So maybe it is strange, but I find hope amidst painful reality in the second benediction of the Amidah, the powers of God, or in Hebrew, the G’vurot:

You are eternally mighty, my Lord, the Resuscitator of the dead are you; abundantly able to save.
He sustains the living with kindness, resuscitates the dead with abundant mercy, supports the fallen, heals the sick, releases the confined, and maintains his faith to those asleep in the dust. Who is like you, O Master of Mighty Deeds, and who is comparable to you, O King who causes death and restores life and makes salvation sprout.
And you are faithful to resuscitate the dead. Blessed are you, HaShem, who resuscitates the dead.

We should put Christopher Hitchens on notice. I’d like to ask all atheists to hear. We do not bow down to a God who misrepresents himself. We don’t bow down to a God who ignores and covers over the truth of misery.

We prostrate ourselves before a God who is honest. He says there will be death. He speaks of saving and thereby admits we will be in pain and in need of rescue. He sustains the living, admitting that we need help in our miserable condition. He releases the confined, admitting we will fill as though imprisoned in this cruel world. He comes right out and says it: HE CAUSES DEATH!

Now, we might complain. We might say, “God, you made it too hard. God, how can you allow this? God, are you unfeeling about our pain?” We might wonder why God does not make all things bearable and easy and good.

It is a legitimate complaint. Everywhere we look we find God encouraging us to think this way. God does not demand that we keep silent about our suffering. He praised Job for his honesty. He inspired Psalms of lament. He inspired the writer of Psalms to complain about him, “How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever?”

Think about that: God inspired someone to complain about him.

The G’vurot prayer is an honest prayer. The G’vurot prayer is a protest against the darkness. The G’vurot prayer is faith when faith seems impossible.

The G’vurot prayer looks at the graves of loved ones and says, “God will raise them.” The G’vurot prayer takes a different path than the atheists. They see cruelty in the world and decide God must be fiction. The G’vurot prayer sees cruelty in the world and vocalized faith in the coming redemption of this broken world.

Atheists would probably laugh at this kind of faith. It is not rational, they would say. I have two things to say about that.

#1: Atheism is not the rational option either, but an angry or sad overreaction.

#2: Love is not rational, but I believe in it all the same.

Next time: more on the G’vurot prayer and its scriptural themes.

Some New Friends and Baptism

Yesterday was one of those rare days that makes a lifetime memory. It started almost two years ago, when I held a naming ceremony for the Jewish grandson of a close friend. The parents are intermarried. He is Jewish. She is not (but she is learning what being Jewish means). (Note: Yes, I am aware of the halakhah regarding Jewish identity being matrilineal–maybe a topic for another time.)

Sometimes our work in Messianic Judaism is to help people reclaim what was lost. This young father is from an interesting Jewish family that became joined with an interesting Baptist family in an old Southern town. If New York has many children of Jews and Catholics, shouldn’t the deep South have the children of Jews and Baptists?

When I was asked to perform the naming ceremony, I was ecstatic. I had a chance to revive a Jewish identity on the edge of extinction. A Jewish ceremony might awaken what was in danger of being lost.

What happened that day was the preparation for a friendship. That friendship was sealed yesterday, when I was able to officiate yet another Jewish ceremony for this young couple.

About two weeks ago, the wife and mother called and said she wanted to be baptized. They were both experiencing God in their lives like never before and felt as though they were cheating God. They had not committed their lives through the ceremony of immersion.

One of the joys of being a spiritual leader is that occasionally, just once in a while, you feel you may actually help people. I suppose doctors must feel this way. For every twenty people who can’t be helped or whose medical care is routine, there is one case that is special. I get that sometimes. I am a catalyst for people, helping them to grab hold of God’s tassel and to be taken along on a journey into mysteries beyond words. Leaders like me, we get too much of the credit.

Through a series of twists and turns we wound up in small Baptist church. It is too cold for a lake, river, or swimming pool. So the nice baptismal pool at this country church was an ideal place.

That too is a story. The young pastor is on his own journey of discovering Israel and the Hebrew scriptures. He is yet another friend made in this story of God touching lives.

We gathered, the young couple and their children, both sets of the young man’s parents and step-parents, the pastor, and a friend from the area. We were a small group.

I explained to them that this ordinary ceremony was an earthly picture of a heavenly reality. We stood in freezing cold water, since the church’s heater would not work, in a slightly rusty baptismal pool. The story of Yeshua’s baptism sounds much more idyllic at the Jordan in the Judean wilderness. But was it really? The Jordan is not an impressive river today and I really don’t think it was back then either. Rivers do have a certain beauty, but they also are quite ordinary.

In Yeshua’s time, baptism was a daily occurrence for some and quite a common sight. Any good tour of Jerusalem will reveal the mikveh pools near the temple, remains of the custom of immersion before entering the temple courts. The Qumran community, those who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, practiced immersion twice a day every day.

The original symbolism is descended from Leviticus. Those who had become unclean were, in some cases, commanded to bathe in order to become clean. The waters of baptism are first a matter of purification.

John the Baptizer added a new dimension. He led a movement in Israel for restoration. John’s way of restoration was not through revolt against Rome but through returning to HaShem. He commanded a baptism as a sign of repentance and a new start. His baptism was not a cleansing before entering a holy area in the temple, but a baptism of life. It was analgous to a wedding ceremony, a commitment of life to live under God’s rule.

Purification and a new start. If anybody needed these least it was Yeshua. He had no impurity. He had none of the false starts in life that are common to man. Yet he walked down from Galilee, no small journey, and saw that it was done. Can we doubt the importance of this earthly sign when our master saw it this way?

Later, a new dimension was added to the meaning of baptism. The act of being buried under the water had always resembled the burial customs of the Middle East. Yet it wasn’t until after Yeshua’s death and resurrection that it became clear that this too was a part of the symbolism of baptism: being buried with Yeshua and then raised with him.

Ordinary water. A few friends to witness the event. A door between heaven and earth is opened. We know how the Father is, always rejoicing in repentance and commitment. We enjoyed the earthly sign he appointed of a heavenly reality. The cold waters and rusty pool became something more.

The kingdom does still grow from time to time. My newfound friends entered into that with their commitment to Yeshua. We went out for coffee afterwards and began to really get to know each other. This is the community of Yeshua. This is how it works.

Questions

This past year has been a year of total re-evaluation of everything I believe. I am actually still in the middle of this process. Several of my comfortable paradigms have been rocked in recent years. Things I once took for granted I now wonder if they are true at all.

This re-evaluation is brutal. It is thorough. You might be surprised to know how deep it has gone for me. On the other hand, maybe you have had similar times of questioning. Maybe you will relate.

I have even been willing to re-evaluate my belief in God. On a day not too long ago, I sat in a Border’s bookstore café devouring pages from recent bestselling books about atheism.

My favorite of the ones I skimmed, and one I wound up reading about half-way through with an eagerness that surprised me, was Christopher Hitchens’ God is Not Great. The blasphemy suggested by the title turned me off, but the quality of the writing drew me in. Hitchens is nothing if not an elegant story-teller. I found his arguments rather compelling. Instead of dismissing them or trying in my head to refute them, I let them stand. I forced myself to hear what he was saying and give it credence.

That night, as I lay in bed thinking before going to sleep, a process that can go on for some time in my case, I tried to be an atheist. For about twenty minutes I attempted to think and breathe like someone who denies God’s very existence.

I said, “God, I do not believe in you.” Then I thought, “That’s ironic. I’m talking to someone and telling them they do not exist!”

I didn’t make a good atheist. My first instinct as an atheist was to pray about whether to be an atheist or not!

Still, I tried. Bertrand Russell said that belief in God is nothing more than a response to fear. It is a response to the fear of death, the fear of hell, and the fear that the universe might be meaningless (Reppert, Victor. C.S. Lewis’s Dangerous Idea. p.31). Fine, Bertrand Russell. Tell me you were not afraid of those very things. We all are. Especially meaninglessness.

I would be a bad atheist because I cannot accept that beauty is merely a hormonal response randomly programmed into me by evolution. I cannot accept that my sense of right and wrong is meaningless and, to paraphrase C.S. Lewis, no more important than a preference for pancakes over spam!

I’ve re-evaluated many other beliefs this year and will continue to do so. I’ve considered abandoning Yeshua and becoming Orthodox. I’ve considered abandoning Yeshua and becoming like the liberal professors I studied under.

I am asking questions.

I am optimistic that I will find resolution to some of my questions. I am a critical realist, not a logical positivist. I do not limit myself to what can be falsified. I believe in love and beauty.

It is my hope that, on this blog, in the upcoming year, I will publish some answers to these kinds of questions. I don’t mean by answer some sort of proof that all reasonable people will accept. Reasonable is relative and how many people are really reasonable anyway?

Here are some of the questions that plague me. I have strong beliefs about many of them. Yet I am not content to rest on old answers. I want new light. In short, here are my questions:

Why did you abandon the world to so much senseless tragedy, God?
How can you expect us to endure this present meaninglessness with primarily nothing but a hope in future redemption?
Who do you save and who do you not save?
What will happen to those who are not saved?
How does a person include themselves, or alternately, how does someone become included, in your salvation?
Why do we need saving and what are we saved from?
What do you want us to believe about Yeshua?
Why did he come, specifically, and what did he accomplish?
Are miracles, such as resurrection and incarnation, possible?
Is there truly a right and wrong?
Is right right because you say so or is our sense of right true and the basis of all your actions?
Are we free or do we only do what you predetermined or is it both?

There are more questions. I am primarily a biblical theologian, an interpreter of texts. I am not a philosopher, though I wish I had time.

I’m just saying that I have questions. Maybe you do too.

A Few Responses to Recent Comments

Shalom all:

I want to respond to several recent comments. I know I don’t always respond to all comments that come in here. I am too busy to always respond. Also, I do not find that all comments need a response.

First, let me say thanks to Rabbi Carl Kinbar, a friend, who corrected me privately about a factual error. I guess I am ruining the privacy by mentioning it publicly! The Tosefta was written down about 275 C.E. and not 400, as I stated. The Tosefta contains rabbinic discussion and opinions not chosen for inclusion in the Mishnah, from 200 C.E. The Tosefta was mentioned in my post on the Noahide laws because the very first mention of the Noahide laws is in the Tosefta. That is, we cannot historically say that anyone was talking about the Noahide laws much before 275, because we have no evidence of it. The silence of the Mishnah on the Noahide laws may suggest that they were not a widely accepted concept in the early centuries.

Second, let me encourage some who make comments on the blog:
1. If you are going to write a lengthy comment responding to what I have said, then write it in a word processor first.
2. Take time to develop what you write.
3. Don’t post poorly thought out sentences strung together haphazardly.
4. Have a flow of argument, a logical order to what you say.

I say this because, some are typing (late at night it seems) rather long responses in a confusing, disordered style. It is hard for us to read and understand what you are saying, because you don’t put your thoughts in order with care to communicate.

I think Michael and Marc have some worthy things to say, but their words are less likely to be heard because they are written sloppily. I would even encourage you to go back and rewrite your comments, to make them more coherent.

Third, Gracie Ruth, God bless you, you know how to make your point succinctly. You said, “Acts 15 is in itself evidence that the Noachide commandments for gentiles were established at the time of the Apostles.”

As I indicated in “Musings on the Noahide Laws, Part 1,” I do not agree. The four prohibitions in Acts 15 for Gentiles are:
1. Abstain from the pollutions of idols and things sacrificed to idols.
2. Abstain from sexual promiscuity.
3. Refrain from eating meat strangled (with the blood in it).
4. Refrain from ingesting blood.

I do not think James had the Noahide laws in mind for several reasons:
1. His prohibitions cover only three of the seven rabbinic Noahide laws.
2. There are other explanations that are far better as to a possible rationale for James’ four prohibitions.

What was James thinking when he said that non-Jews would not need to be circumcised and take on Torah yet they should carefully observe these four prohibitions?

I like an explanation I found in a commentary by Tim Hegg (whom I rarely agree with). These four areas are all things non-Jews would find in their involvement in pagan temples. Idolatry and meat sacrificed to idols, temple prostitution, strangled meat, and in some cases rites involving the eating of blood were customs from the temples of the day. These social practices would be too abhorrent for Jews to tolerate in mixing with non-Jews. These things needed stopping immediately.

I have also heard another possible source for James’ four prohibitions. Some say he had Leviticus 17-18 in mind, as descriptions of abominable practices that must be stopped. Let me ask for help here from the readers. Does someone know the argument for Leviticus being the source for the prohibitions of Acts 15? I admit, I have forgotten the case for Leviticus as the source, but I seem to recall there was a good case for it. Bonus points to anyone who can present the case (logically and coherently, please).

Finally, both Michael and Marc, if you can work through their disjointed prose, bring up the argument that Deuteronomy 14:21 is about unrighteous Gentiles. Deuteronomy 14:21 says that Jews are permitted to sell meat found dead to the stranger or the foreigner. I argued from this that God permits non-Jews to eat all meat except meat with the blood still in it. Marc and Michael argued that God does not permit non-Jews to do so. Only non-Jews who reject God and care nothing for his law may do so.

Let me say several things about this. One, the stranger or sojourner mentioned in Deuteronomy 14:21 is a non-Jew living in the land protected by and under the rule of the laws of the land. But even if we accept the notion that some sojourners in the land were not held to much of a standard, even if we are talking about complete and utter pagans, my argument still stands.

God says that Israel may sell unclean meat to non-Jews. If the eating of unclean meat is a sin, then it is a sin to profit from causing sin. I have used the illustration: would God allow us to sell crack to modern pagans? Obviously not. But God did not command non-Jews to observe the dietary laws. Not even righteous Gentiles. Not even the sojourner in the gates who draws near to Israel. There is no valid Torah argument for non-Jews to keep kosher, period.

Soon I will get back to the Noahide laws. I will argue that they are not part of Second Temple Judaism at all. I will argue that they are not part of the background of the New Testament. I will also argue that they are not an accurate depiction of the relationship of Torah to non-Jews. I hope you will pay attention and correct me where I am wrong (especially you, Mr. Shalom Bayit).

Musings on the Noahide Laws, Part 1

There is a concept in Jewish sources, a concept greatly magnified in later writings and emphasized today by Chabad (Lubavitch). It is the concept that non-Jews will relate to God through a much smaller body of law than the Torah. Instead of Torah, non-Jews are bound to the Noahide laws, according to various Jewish sources.

Noah preceded Abraham and there was not yet a covenant people of God. This is significant because God gave certain commands to Noah that are for all humankind:
1. Do not eat blood or meat with blood (9:4).
2. Do not murder (9:5-6).
3. Permitting all animals as food (9:2-3).

It is apparent from the commandments to Noah that the nations are not bound by the dietary law of Israel. All meats, even creeping things, are permitted to the nations. From this principle, the later rabbis derived the doctrine of the Noahide Laws. The concept of the Noahide Laws first appeared in the Tosefta, writings of the sages written down around 275 C.E.

The Noahide laws teach that Gentiles need not, in some cases must not, keep Torah commands. Gentiles will have a share in the World to Come, say some rabbis, only if they keep the Noahide laws. There is a lesser kind of convert, a Ger Toshav, who is define as a Gentile who keeps the Noahide laws. The Noahide laws are said to have been taught and part of Judaism since the days of Moses (but note that the evidence for this concept did not appear until 400 C.E.). The Noahide laws include seven basic prohibotions against:
1. Idolatry
2. Blasphemy
3. Eating blood
4. Murder
5. Theft
6. Sexual promiscuity
7. Injustice (they should establish courts of justice)

Rabbi Harvey Falk, in his book Jesus the Pharisee, suggests that the Noahide laws were what Yeshua and the apostles came to teach. They accepted Judaism for Jews and sought to create a Gentile religion based on the Noahide laws. It is a very creative theory, but with extremely shaky evidence to back it up.

There are some things we can deduce from the actual commandments to Noah in Genesis 9, though the later concept of seven specific Noahide laws is a problematic concept whose authority I deem to be questionable. First, we can deduce that God did not restrict the animals which non-Jews are permitted to eat. This is confirmed in the Torah (Deut. 14:21). Second, we can deduce that God has laws for non-Jews, and even some that are not strictly rational, such as the commandment not to eat blood or meat with the blood in it. Yet, the idea that non-Jews have a share in the World to Come based upon obeying these laws is not founded in the teaching of the Bible. Further, the idea that Yeshua sought to establish the Noahide laws as a religion for Gentiles is not historically sound.

There are some things in the New Testament that seem similar to Noahide laws. In Acts 15, James urged that the non-Jews in the Yeshua movement would de diligent to observe four commands:
1. Abstain from the pollutions of idols and things sacrificed to idols.
2. Abstain from sexual promiscuity.
3. Refrain from eating meat strangled (with the blood in it).
4. Refrain from ingesting blood.

Note that the list from Acts 15 essentially covers three of the seven Noahide laws. Note also that there are other rationales for the Acts 15 list. Some would find here a practical legislation designed to immediately get non-Jews separated from pagan temple institutions, including idol-meat, meat not drained of blood, and temple prostitution. Others would see Leviticus 17 and 18 behind the commands to non-Jews in Acts 15, a standard of holiness in the congregations to avoid extreme pollution.

There are other possible parallels to the Noahide laws in the New Testament. Paul, in several lists of damnable deeds, includes things like: fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, and robbers (1 Cor. 6:9-10, see also Colossians 3:5-6 and Ephesians 5:5-6). This list has some similarity to the Noahide laws, but does not exactly match either. It is hard to see that Paul would get “the greedy” from the Noahide laws, nor “drunkards.”

What is the relationship of the Torah to non-Jews? Are the Noahide laws an accurate summary of all of God’s expectation of non-Jews? Do the Noahide laws seem to be part of the program of Paul or Yeshua?

Next time . . .

Ages Past and To Come

Eden
…of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die… Genesis 2:17

Eden was not the perfect paradise, not yet. God made man and woman innocent. He had a plan to teach them more, good and evil, the meaning of free will and righteousness. Eden was a paradise waiting to happen if man and woman would love God in spite of the choice to do otherwise. There was no death. There was not yet any evil there. But evil had been introduced already among the sons of God, the heavenly beings. And one, in the form of a serpent, brought that evil into the almost-paradise and it wasn’t. Men and women have been living in exile ever sense. But the memory of paradise lives on and draws us on.

The Nations Before Abraham
Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and there confuse their language… Genesis 11:6-7

Depravity and mob mentality spread quickly in this period. God was bothered most by the violence and sent the flood to slow the spread of evil. General revelations to the nations did not bring people to trust in God. They began to make gods in their image rather than honor the God who made them in his.

Patriarchal Days
…in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. Genesis 12:3

God chose one man. He made a plan that was fool-proof because it depended only on divine providence. All Abraham’s descendants had to do was be born. God would bless the nations through his offspring. Faith was not a prerequisite and neither was obedience. The existence of the Jewish people, the children of Jacob, is all God needs to redeem and perfect this world. From Jacob on the world became divided into Israel and the nations and God’s plan always comes through Israel to bless the nations.

Torah and the Land
…and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Exodus 19:6

The children of Jacob received the Torah, the revelation of who God is and what he expects of his people. They soon after received the land, the place from which all of God’s great plans for redeeming and perfecting the world would take place. A holy book and a holy land were given to a holy people. Yet even if Israel was not obedient, God’s work through them was destined to succeed. They were to be priests, willing or not, and the world has been changed by the children of Jacob. From the calendar to the world’s outlook on religion, nothing has been the same since.

Exile
By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion. Psalm 137:1

Jerusalem, like Eden, was now a place cut off from them. They prayed they would never forget the dream that had been Jerusalem, Zion the city of God. The ark and the glory were gone. The holy people were captives now in the nations. When it was at last time to return, relatively few came. The second temple was not so glorious. But among those exiles and returnees hope began to grow. Pious ones and seers taught of a coming time of righteousness, cataclysm, and Messiah. Angels and visions of the end were growing in the people’s imagination. They were a people waiting for Messiah.

Messiah’s Appearance
So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” John 12:13

He came in a way that was far less dramatic than many had hoped. He subverted their ideas about the kingdom of God, the coming Messianic Age. He did not put away Rome, but called Israel to return instead to the Father. He seemed an ordinary man, or at least far more ordinary than they had imagined. What good were miracles and healings when the people wanted glory and to put away the great oppressor that was Rome. Thousands welcomed him as Israel’s king, but the nation as a whole saw only a strange martyr.

Times of the Gentiles
…a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. Romans 11:25

All Israel will be saved, but this is the time of the nations. From Jerusalem the word went out and men and women from all over the empire turned to Israel’s God and Israel’s unclaimed Messiah. Very quickly Israel was forgotten. In a short time, many even denied that God still worked through the children of Jacob. It has been an era of great glory and also of great tragedy. Men have loved the Jewish Messiah while rejecting the Jewish people. And the hearts of Israel have grown harder. But the times of the Gentiles are closing and the days of Israel are coming.

Regathering
I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. Ezekiel 36:24

All through history, a few faithful Jews had made the land their dream. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries they trickled in. They drained swamps. They reclaimed unwanted land within the borders of God’s promise. Against all odds, and only after a near genocide, they reclaimed the land in 1948 and Jerusalem in 1967. And still they are being gathered, as only one third are now there. Few of the promises of restoration have yet come to pass. Yet many dare to dream. Visionaries. Some are preparing the third temple. Others pray for the peace of Jerusalem. We can feel the winds of Messiah.

Tribulation
Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed. Daniel 9:26

Trumpets will blow. Bowls will be poured out. People will ask mountains to fall on them and cover them from God’s anger. Even Jerusalem will be overrun by the end. The holy city will be attacked. All nations will joined the battle called Armageddon. Israel will turn to Messiah, starting with a group called the 144,000. These are pious young men who will lead their nation to Messiah. After great pain, he will stand on the Mount of Olives and rescue his people. Redemption and perfection are now near.

Days of Messiah
Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Messiah, and they will reign with him for a thousand years. Revelation 20:6

The Holy One, the King, will take his throne in Jerusalem. A river of life will flow from the temple there and trees with healing leaves will grow on its banks. The faithful from all the previous eras will be here, resurrected and never to die again. Even those born in this time will live long lives, with one hundred being a young age to die. There will not be a grape which does not yield at least thirty measures of wine and every person will sit under his own vine and fig tree. The nations will all come, year after year at Sukkot, to worship Messiah Yeshua at his Jerusalem temple. And Jerusalem will be called “Adonai is our righteousness.”

Final Age
And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. Revelation 21:2

The last deception will be at the end of the days of Messiah and the Satan will lead many astray. But after his rebellion is put away, all sin and death will cease. The faithful will enter into the magic hills and go beyond the joys even of the days of Messiah. It will be a New Earth and a New Jerusalem, like the best things of the old, only better. Everything good in this life will be better in the World to Come. Everything bad will be gone forever. And there will be no sun or moon, for Adonai will be our light.

Musings on the Amidah, Part 2

The first benediction of the Amidah is the Avot, the fathers. Before we pray it, we say:

My Lord, open up my lips so my mouth can speak your praise.

Then, before we pray it, we bow and walk forward three steps, drawing near to the holy.

We remain bowed through the opening blessing:

Blessed are you, HaShem our God and the God of our forefathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

We pray standing for respect and with out feet together for attention. Many of us sway back and forth, which is called shuckling. For me, it adds concentration to my prayer. I also can’t help but feel I am bowing repeatedly to the holy.

There are many themes I could choose to muse on in the Avot, the first benediction of the Amidah. But I choose the theme of beginnings and endings, the spiritual bookends, if you would, of our faith. From the Fathers to the Redeemer.

Blessed are you, HaShem our God, and the God of our forefathers, God of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob; the great, mighty, and awesome God, the supreme God who bestows beneficial kindnesses and creates everything, who recalls the kindnesses of the Patriarchs and brings a Redeemer to their children’s children for his name’s sake with love.
O King, Helper, Savior, and Shield.
Blessed are you, HaShem, shield of Abraham.

What does it mean to you that your faith has come through a chain of people all the way back to Abraham?

Let me share with you how Jacob expressed it when he blessed Ephraim and Manasseh:

And he blessed Joseph and said,
      “The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked,
      the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day…Genesis 48:15

Jacob had made many mistakes. He was no spiritual giant. He was like us.

Jacob had tried to live his life on his own. He tried tricks and schemes. He made bargains with God. If you do this for me I will do this for you. Once he thought he found a place where God gave out blessings. He thought of God in limited ways.

Yet God kept blessing him more than he deserved. Even when he did things the wrong way, there was still a blessing that came with his life.

So as Jacob passed it on to the next generation…
…he remembered…

The God before whom my fathers, Abraham and Isaac walked. You and I can pray that. Non-Jews also can pray it, since Abraham is the father of all who have faith as well as the father of the Chosen People, Israel.

Paul said of Israel in his day, “As regards the good news of Messiah, they are enemies for your sake, but as regards election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers” (Rom. 11:28). That is, even though Paul felt his own generation in Israel was missing out, messing up, and missing God, they were still connected. Through the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

When you pray this benediction, it places you into something bigger. When we pray with Israel, we pray to the shepherd of Israel. We include ourselves in the blessings of Israel.

That is the beginning, the first bookend. But this prayer also speaks of the ending, the final bookend.

It speaks of a Redeemer coming to their children’s children with love. Whose children? The children of the Patriarchs.

There are many ways to think of Messiah. He is the Son of David. The king like David who restores Israel. He is the righteousness of Jerusalem. He is the sin-bearer of Isaiah 53. He is the righteous judge. He brings a kingdom to end all others. He shatters history’s feet of clay. He is the Suffering Servant, the Anointed Conqueror. He is the King.

But the first benediction of the Amidah reminds us of another concept of Messiah. The whole benediction is in the context of Abraham. It brings to mind…

Genesis 22:18
and in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.

This verse is multi-layered. Seed is a collective plural. It can mean one or many.

In the sense of seed being many, it means all Israel, all the children of Jacob. The nations of the world will be blessed through Israel.

But seed is also singular. The Seed of Abraham is not only Israel, but more specifically…Messiah.

These are the BOOKENDS of history. Abraham — Messiah.

Abraham, the father of our faith. Messiah, the goal of our faith.

Abraham the beginning. Messiah the blessed end.

From one man, Abraham, God brought blessing and faith to many. In one man, Messiah, all those hopes find their ultimate rest.

God brings a redeemer to their children’s children with love. From Abraham to Messiah. From faith begun to faith realized.

The Amidah begins with a sweeping view of the beginning of faith and God’s family to the destination or goal.

Where does it leave us? As we are swaying back and forth, reverently mumbling like Hannah praying at the sanctuary so many centuries ago. Where does this prayer locate us in the continuum of God’s plan for the ages.

The prayer locates us in the middle, between Abraham and Messiah. Where else could we possibly want to be?

Upcoming Books

I want to share a little with all of you about some of my upcoming writing projects. I have been a writing fool for the past few months, working on some freelance assignments and write-for-hire as well as my own book, The World to Come.

First, let me tell you about Feast. I was contacted by a new department of LifeWay, the mega-publisher associated with the Southern Baptists. LifeWay has many departments, including Broadman and Holman, who produce Bible and Christian books.

They have a new department called Threads, which you can see at threadsmedia.com. This is a media-savvy group publishing material for small group studies and especially aimed at 20’s.

Threads asked me to do a six-part study on the Feasts. Through the teaching of people like Rob Bell, a young pastor in Grand Rapids Michigan whose popularity is just slightly less than that of Messiah himself, many emerging Christians have developed a respect for and passion to know about Judaism and how faith in Jesus grew out of it.

Here is a very short excerpt from Feast. It will be available in March of 2008:

In another place, many centuries ago, the place of worship was outdoors. On a small mountain, Mount Zion, the temple sat. The stones shone like gold in the late afternoon sun. In fact there was gold on some parts of the temple.

In front of the building was a courtyard with a large altar. A fire was always burning. Parts of animals were always going up in smoke.

Hundreds of thousands are gathered. There are no pews. There are no chairs. There is no ceiling or windows or chandeliers or projection screens. There are Levitical choirs of hundreds and also hundreds of musicians. There are priests leading prayers and psalms as well as attending to sacrificial duties. This is the worship of Israel at the temple, the central sanctuary of Israel.

To be sure, there is a building. But no one is inside. The building is God’s temple. It has two rooms. Only the priests go inside and they can only go into the first room.

At the back of the temple, though only the priests have even seen the veil that covers it, there is another room. It is the Holy of Holies. God is in there. God is hidden, separate.

The people just try to get close. Close to a temple where God is hidden in the back room. The building is not the place of worship. It houses the object of their worship: the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Does the worship of the Israelites seem better, inferior, or simply different from our way of worship? Explain.

Some might say, “Our worship is better. Our worship is in spirit and theirs was not. Their worship was primitive. Ours is advanced.”

If an Israelite could visit your church, what would he or she say? “Where is the glory of God hidden in your sanctuary? Why is the crowd so small? Where is the reverence? Why aren’t people chanting Psalms?”

The Israelite in temple times did not see God, hidden in the Holy of Holies in the back of the temple. But neither do we. God is hidden to us as well.

Next, let me tell you about The World to Come. It is due out in March also, by Lederer, also known as Messianic Jewish Resources (www.messianicjewish.net).

I wanted to write a book about coming events in God’s plan and, more so, the nature of the Messianic Age and the New Earth that are coming. I am a major fan of C.S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce and I appreciated Randy Alcorn’s book, Heaven. Add to this the beautiful descriptions of the prophets (“every man a vine and fig tree”) and the rabbis (“there will not be a grape which will not yield thirty measures of wine in the world to come”).

Here is a very short excerpt from The World to Come:

The Bible does not tell us everything about the World To Come. Yet it tells us enough to know more than what it says. From the Bible we determine that there is another text, one that lies alongside the Bible and prefigures the World To Come.

The desires of the heart point the way. The unsatisfied desire will at last be satisfied. Joy will be real.

A man climbs a peak to find a trout pond in the clear mountain air. It is a sign. A woman enjoys a story of love found at last. It is a sign. A child looks longingly at a picture in a storybook. It is a sign.

We can experience signs every day, though we easily overlook them. We can be reminded a thousand times what the World To Come may be like. It is there in beauty. We look at the face of our mate and we see a hint of heaven. Our toes curl in green grass and we know paradise is real. We hear a child’s innocent laughter and we can imagine. We forget ourselves and fall into the joy of friends and conversation, and we can imagine true companionship.

Joy in this world is a text alongside the Bible, clueing us in to the World to Come.

I also have a six-session study on themes from Job coming out before March. And in 2008, Lederer has asked me to write another book on Yeshua, which I’m hoping will be titled In Yeshua’s Sandals, and another book on Paul. These last two will be expansions of and updates on my earlier books, Jesus Didn’t Have Blue Eyes and Paul Didn’t Eat Pork.

In short, I have a lot of writing coming out in the next year or so. I hope to be able to share more about them with you.

I think that a solid understanding of Judaism brings much that is missing in thought about Messiah and the life of faith in Yeshua. I am trying to give a fuller, richer view of this life.

Isaiah 53

Can there be a text more debated than or more important than Isaiah 53 in Messianic Judaism?

Here is my take on it:
http://tikvatdavid.com/Torah%20Study_files/Isaiah%2053PDF.pdf

Musings on the Amidah, Part 1

Sh’moneh Esrei — eighteen benedictions. So important in Judaism, simply called “the prayer,” haTefillah.

Those reciting it face Israel. Those in Israel face Jerusalem. Those in Jerusalem face the temple. If you’re not sure which way to face, the rabbis say, direct your heart toward God.

The prayer is also known as the Amidah, the Standing Prayer. We stand while reciting it out of respect. We pray it with our feet together. This is to help us remain at attention.

We take three steps forward and bow at the beginning. This is to DRAW NEAR to the Holy One. We take three steps back at the end. This is to WITHDRAW after we have completed our petitions.

There is not just one form of the Amidah. The one we pray on Shabbat is shorter. The middle petitions are replaced by a shorter section.

What better topic than to muse on the meaning of the greatest prayer in Judaism? For non-Jews, I hope this series will illuminate the beauty of Jewish prayer, a beauty which is sadly underestimated in much Christian opinion. For Messianic Jews, I hope this series will help you grow into an appreciation for a prayer tradition sadly underestimated in Messianic Judaism as well.

The Amidah has nineteen benedictions, since one was added later. It is still called the Sh’moneh Esrei, meaning eighteen benedictions.

The first three benedictions are praise. Rabbi Hanina said, “It resembles a servant who praises his master.”

The middle thirteen are petitions. Rabbi Hanina said, “It resembles a servant requesting some gift from his master.”

The last three are thanksgivings. Rabbi Hanina said, “It resembles a servant who has received his gift and takes his leave.”

The Amidah is recited silently, but with the lips moving. The tradition is to pray it so you can distinguish the words you are speaking but your neighbor cannot. It is a kind of mumbling. It is a mumbled prayer, like the prayer of Hannah in 1 Samuel:

As she continued praying before the Lord, Eli observed her mouth. Hannah was speaking in her heart; only her lips moved, and her voice was not heard. Therefore Eli took her to be a drunken woman. And Eli said to her, “How long will you go on being drunk? Put away your wine from you.” But Hannah answered, “No, my lord, I am a woman troubled in spirit. I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman, for all along I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation.” Then Eli answered, “Go in peace, and the God of Israel grant your petition that you have made to him.” -1 Samuel 1:12-17

If you have ever prayed with a minyan, a group of Jewish men (and in some places women), you have experienced the silent Amidah. Throughout the room there are groanings, mumbling sounds. Those swaying and concentrating get louder and softer in a kind of rhythm. Throughout the room there are indistinguishable or barely distinguishable words.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I picture Hebrew words and phrases rising above the minyan and floating up into the heavens. I can almost see the prayers more than I hear them.

These groanings are the words of the needy. They are the prayers of the desperate. They are the prayers of Hannah replayed thousands of years later. All Israel is connected by prayer, and especially by the praying of the Amidah.

If you haven’t prayed this prayer in a minyan, what can I say? Go and learn.

The Prophecy of Prophecies, Part 1

Imagine being told from the beginning you were going to fail at something. Imagine if someone showed you a vision of coming pain and suffering that would go on for generations. Imagine if your idealism was, from the beginning, conditioned to be put off, delayed until a great, unknown future.

This is what God did through Moshe Rabbeinu, Moses the Great One.

Moses is the first prophet in the full sense. I know Genesis 20:7 speaks of Abraham that way, but it was only in a limited sense. Moses was more than a lawgiver. He was more than the mouthpiece for his generation. He was the one to whom God gave the prophecy of prophecies, the foundational prophecy, the pattern. Like that heavenly sanctuary that was the model for the earthly, Moses’ final vision was an ultimate paradigm.

To deal with this prophecy, we first must understand the honesty of God with regard to pain, suffering, and cruelty.

The fact is, God has a higher tolerance for pain than mere mortals. In fact, to us, he seems more than a little callous and uncaring. Don’t worry, I’m not blaspheming. I’m agreeing with the psalmist who asked, “How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever?” I’m right there with Job, who said, “The arrows of the Almighty are in me; my spirit drinks their poison.”

So, before Moses’ great final vision, he saw what the pain of Israel’s future would be. There are things in Deuteronomy 28 too horrible to relate. Some of them might sound bearable when we simply read of them. Starvation. It doesn’t sound so bad. It has happened a lot and is happening around us. We who’ve never experienced it can be callous about it. But the experience, the horror of it. If we were going through such a time, we might imagine the sacrifices we would make for our children. We would torture ourselves, trying to get a little something to the little ones to eat. They would suffer most. And in spite of our own gnawing hunger, the greatest pain would be when, in spite of our self-sacrifice, we watched their bright eyes dim and leave this world.

I could go on about the horrors of Deuteronomy 28. I hope you are satisfied to know it gets worse.

The blessings and, even more so, the curses of Deuteronomy 28 are the background of the prophecy of prophecies, the paradigm of the ages. The prophecy was part of Moses’ last great message before his concluding song and soon after his death on Mt. Nebo:

And when all these things come upon you,
the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you,
and you call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God has driven you,
and return to the Lord your God, you and your children, and obey his voice in all that I command you today,
with all your heart and with all your soul,
then the Lord your God will restore your fortunes and have compassion on you,
and he will gather you again from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you.
If your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there the Lord your God will gather you,
and from there he will take you.
And the Lord your God will bring you into the land that your fathers possessed,
that you may possess it.
And he will make you more prosperous and numerous than your fathers.
And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring,
so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.
Deuteronomy 30:1-6

The generation Moses spoke to may have been an idealistic generation. They were the sons and daughters of those who came out of Egypt. They were the conquering generation, ready to take the lowlands and maybe even the highlands from the Canaanites and inherit their possession in the land of milk and honey. They were on the edge of greatness.

And Moses said, “When all these things have come upon you, the blessing and the curse . . . .” Right there the history of the tribes of Jacob was foreshadowed. Assyrian slaughter, Babylonian exile. Roman oppression. Christian anti-Semitism. Nazi extermination.

I do not believe God devised these cruelties to punish his people. I believe he endured them along with Israel. I believe he wept for the murdered children of Rachel. Nonetheless, he did not step in to save. He allowed evil beyond imagination, and not just for Israel, but among all peoples in the world.

Rightly we would cry out, “How long, O Lord?” Many people have rejected God specifically for this reason. I think of all the reasons to reject God, this one has the greatest part of his sympathy. God has never been one to punish lamenters.

And God gives the tribes of Jacob something to hold on to. He gives them hope.

Delayed hope.

Today we have a fuller picture but the same paradigm. Messianism. The days of Messiah. The Olam HaBa, the World to Come.

These all come from the prophecy of prophecies. This is the paradigm. All else is the filling out of the paradigm.

Coming soon: In Part 2, we will begin looking at the prophecies of delayed hope that follow the pattern set in Deuteronomy 30. We will see that the prophets expanded on Torah more so than they innovated. God gave the paradigm to Moses and further revelations through the prophets generally expanded on ideas already found in seed form in Torah.