Judaism

My new article is a followup on my previous one The Jewish Journal’s Mark Paredes on “Are Mormons Christians?”.

This time we note that when it comes to Messianic Jews, Mark Paredes claim that it is up to individual opinion whether or not they are still or otherwise actually Jews.
Yet, Mormons are Christians regardless of opinion.
A rather odd, yet not unexpected, turn of events:

There are a few points to the Jewish and Christian polemic over, the mother of all disputed texts, Isaiah 52:13-53:12 (succinctly referred to as Isaiah 53).
The following parsed essay is a basic rundown of the charges made against Christianity and some responses from the context of the text and from rabbinic writings.
The charges are made by what I will term Modern Rabbinic Judaism; meaning that the Rabbis decide the authoritative interpretations.

This essay is parsed thusly:

Part 1: Introduction and Context
Part 2: Various Rabbis and Jewish Scholars

What does the New Testament mean by its use of the term “the Jews”?
Does it mean every Jewish person who ever lived?
Or perhaps those in Jerusalem at the time.
Or maybe those who did not believe that Jesus is the Messiah.
In this parsed essay we will explore this question in these parts:

Part 1: Introduction and The Blood Libel
Part 2: Crucifixion Was Roman and Not Jewish and Who is Responsible for Jesus’ Death?
Part 3: Falsity
Part 4: Conclusion

What a sad way for Helen Thomas to end an otherwise momentous career.
Yet, this sadness is utterly nothing in comparison to that which we Jews have endured through the millennia.

It is also interesting how the new cycles, pop-culture and politically correct movement are so very selective. For example, Helen Thomas is rightly criticized for her answer to being asked if she had any comments on Israel,

Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine. Remember, these people are occupied and it's their land. It's not Germany, not Poland.

Moishe Rosen, founder of Jews for Jesus, has gone home to meet the Messiah Jesus face to face.

Let us consider some of his background and some of the controversy.

The New York Times reported:1

1. 1. Margalit Fox, “Moishe Rosen Dies at 78; Founder of Jews for Jesus,” New York Times, May 21, 2010

Jesus may have been rejected yet, the Talmud makes some very interesting statements that we ought to seriously consider because it is beyond question that something happened that changed the Jewish religion and thus, changed the world of Judaism forever.

What was this occurrence?

The Temple Institute,

In this parsed essay we will present some example of the charges of corruption made against Christianity and some examples of the Rabbinic manner of interpretation.

Part 1: The Charges (and the problems for those making them)
Part 2: The Targumim
Part 3: Targum Yerushalmi or Jerusalem and Targum Onkelos or Onqelos and Targum Jonathan or Pseudo-Jonathan
Part 4: Fragmentary Targum and Targum Neofiti and Examples of Rabbinic Interpretation

Various Rabbis and Jewish Scholars:
Rabbi Maimonides,

Encyclopedia Judaica 6:861 & 10:390,

"The Bible has no word for the abstract idea of eschatology. It does however, have a term-'aharit ha-yamim-that often has eschatological connotations, at least in the broad sense mentioned above, it means literally 'the end of the days' i.e., 'the end of time.'_.

A publication titled "Issues" points out four facts about the Messiah,

"FACT ONE: The Messiah's appearance was locked into a fixed time.
FACT TWO: that fixed time was while the Second Temple was still standing.
FACT THREE: the Messiah had to come from a specific lineage that was only verifiable through the Temple records.
And the FOURTH STARTLING FACT is that the Messiah had to die a violent death. The details of these facts together present some of the strongest evidence that he has in fact already come."

The meaning given to these signs is,

"Men. 109b. Tosaf Sotah 38a suggests that the Ineffable Name could be pronounced only when there was some indication that the Shechinah rested on the Sanctuary. When Simon the Righteous died, with many indications that such glory was no more enjoyed, his brethren no more dared utter the Ineffable Name."1

Jewish scholar Jacob Neusner,

1. 1. See Yoma 39b, footnote 1, p. 186 of the Soncino Babylonian Talmud
   

Norman Lamm; President of Yeshiva University,

This essay seeks to elucidate some of the biblical symbolism which points to the Messiah.

Part 1: The Seed and the Coming Messiah and Isaac and the Future Sacrifice
Part 2: Isaac and the Future Sacrifice (continued) and The Serpent in the Wilderness and the Lifting Up of the Messiah

If you have been following along in our shared study of the doctrine of the Trinity, you will be "ready to given an answer" (1st Peter 3:15) when you encounter fallacious claims regarding God's nature or claims of contradiction.
Consider the following exercise upon which I embarked as I considered the "Skeptic's Annotated Bible" as a Heuristic Device.

With regards to the interpretation of the scriptures some of the conflicts amongst Jews and Christians are due to the fact that the Jewish understanding of the scripture has been, and is being, redefined and reinterpreted.

Some Rabbis, Torah teachers, Jewish scholars and particularly anti-missionaries are now claiming that Jews have always believed in things that Jews have actually not always believed and they claim that Jews have never believed things that Jews actually have believed.

Various Scholars:
Risto Santala,

Various Scholars:

Rabbinic Writings:
Pesikta Rabbati 37:1,

In the month of Nisan, in the year when the Messiah appears, the Patriarchs will ask him whether he is displeased with Israel because of the affliction he endured on their account. The Messiah will reply that all he did was for the sake of the Patriarchs and the children of Israel, that they might benefit from God's abundant goodness. Then God will cloak the Messiah in something of the splendor of His own glory_

There seems to be two issues in dealing polemically with Psalm 22. One issue is whether v.16 should read "they pierced" as Christianity claims, or "like a lion" as Judaism claims. The second issue is the question of whether this Psalm is Messianic or not.

We will consider:

Part 1: Intro and Rabbinic Writings
Part 2: Rabbinic Writings (continued)
Part 3: Various Scholars
Part 4: Various Scholars (continued)

Isaiah ch. 9, particularly verses 6-7 are a polemical issue betwixt Judaism and Christianity.
The key question is: does the text refer to the, at the time of the writing, future Messiah and therefore to Jesus-as Christianity claims-or to a person contemporaneous to the times when the text was inspired-as Judaism claims?

Part 1: Introduction and From the Talmud
Part 2: The Targumim and The Midrashim
Part 3: Various Rabbis and Jewish Scholars
Part 4: Another Aspect of this Issue