Pending Divorce

When I counsel an interfaith couple contemplating marriage, I always ask them to imagine what their life together will look like in five, ten, and twenty years. These pictures vary greatly. While no one can predict the future, and many things - positive and negative - give direction to our personal journeys, it is important for partners to hear each other's dreams. This is particularly important because the future that couples imagine as adults is often different from what they pictured as their adult lives when they were children, or even a few years earlier. It is also helpful for me to hear what each partner has to say aloud, so that I can identify for them what issues are yet to be resolved before they make a long-term commitment to each other.

From Making a Successful Jewish Interfaith Marriage
by Rabbi Kerry M. Olitzky and Joan Peterson Littman

I finished reading this book yesterday and while interesting and instructive, it didn't really apply to my particular intermarried situation. My wife and I were married when neither one of us were religious and my wife's Jewish mother (her father wasn't Jewish) died many years before we met. My wife's mother had estranged herself from her family on the East Coast decades before, so I had no Jewish in-laws with whom to relate, and so at that time, 100 percent of what this book talks about didn't exist for me.

That has changed considerably...but my marriage isn't what I want to talk about.

At different points in the book, as the authors were describing the various challenges facing intermarried couples, I couldn't help but draw comparisons to the "relationship" of the Jewish and Gentile disciples of the Jewish Messiah who have chosen a "Messianic" (for lack of a better term) expression of their faith (as opposed to a traditional Christian model). In many ways, our relationship with each other is like a mixed Jewish-Gentile partnership in terms of the difficulties we face and the hurdles we must overcome.

But sometimes it feels like a "shotgun wedding"; something arranged by someone outside of the couple and perhaps something either the "groom" or "bride" never really wanted.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” -Matthew 28:19-20

Meet the guy holding the "shotgun".

If Yeshua hadn't given this directive, I suppose things would have been a lot easier on everyone. Judaism in all it's variations would be wholly owned and operated by Jews and any non-Jews who entered the doors of a synagogue would be God-fearers and Noahides...a minor subset of the overall population. Assuming Paul wasn't chosen (and if there was no Matthew 28:19-20, why would he have been chosen) to be an emissary to the Gentiles, Gentiles would have continued to be idol worshipers and pagans, probably to this very day. Maybe Messianic Judaism would have been maintained as a Judaism recognized by all the other variations instead of seen as a form of Christianity.

Olitzky's and Littman's book tells a story (it's not written in a way that's easy to quote, so I'll just tell it outright) of a married couple who attended a Reform synagogue for many decades. The Jewish husband died and was buried in a Jewish cemetary. His wife continued to go to shul, be an integral part of the Jewish community, and live like a Jew well into her 90s, when she also died.

People had forgotten that she had never formally converted to Judaism (a decision made originally to avoid hurting her Christian parents when she was first married) but her will stated that she wanted to be buried next to her husband. She had purchased the plot and all was in order...except she wasn't Jewish. Apparently there was a huge debate on the matter since the woman lived a lifestyle just as Jewish as anyone else in the synagogue for almost 70 years. The responsible authorities finally agreed that the woman should be buried next to her husband, but several Jewish families left the synagogue permanently over the decision.

Isn't life swell?

I know someone's going to come along and quote culture, tradition, and law and say that this elderly woman's wishes should have been denied because she never formally converted, but like Ruth (who is an ancestor both of David and the Messiah), she lived an absolutely Jewish lifestyle for the vast majority of her days, perhaps more Jewish than many born but secular Jews.

At what point does tradition and halachah give way to compassion?

One of the book's authors, Joan Peterson Littman, converted to Judaism quite some time ago and leads classes for intermarried couples in her Jewish community. She tells the following story:

The more we learn, the more we discover how much we don't know - even after living a Jewish family life (convert to Judaism or not) for many years. But the feelings of "otherness" don't always go away. Joan reminds us, "I still get scared, after living a Jewish life all these years. I recently walked into a Jewish day school in the community in a swarm of teenage boys wearing yarmulkes. They all gave me the look, which I interpreted as 'What is she doing here?' - what I have come to call my 'goyim alert'. Later I came to understand that they were simply curious, wondering what I, an unfamiliar face, was doing at the school." It's easy to be defeated and feel afraid, to feel that you may never "get it", and disengage as a result. But it is far better to be motivated now and prepare for the life ahead of you. Rather than seeing the "long road" as a "long haul", join us as we see it, as a road filled with opportunity and joy.

One of the reasons I'm leaving the "Messianic world" this summer after many years is because I don't see road filled with opportunity and joy. While I can read an intent in the Apostolic Scriptures for a role for Gentiles in the Messianic community, I don't really see one. The recent "battles" over the acceptability (or lack thereof) of One Law and Two-House "participants" points out that, despite the fact that the majority of people in "formal" Messianic Judaism are Gentiles, we still struggle, like in the stories I just related, to fit in and be accepted. We are never sure we are "part of the family". I've heard stories of people who were adopted, grew up, got married, lived to middle age, and yet still were never sure that anyone truly loved them, all because they were given up they their birth parents.

Sure, Yeshua can say "make disciples of all nations, yada, yada, yada", but it took 15 years for that directive to even start to be enacted. It also required God to give Peter a special "nudge" (see Acts 10) before he got off the dime and visited the house of a righteous God-fearer. To this day, the Jews who worship the Messiah don't really want us there, particularly if we are tainted with having a "One Law" background or history.

My wife is (non-Messianic) Jewish so we are intermarried, and she has a more willing acceptance of my faith and religious orientation than most Jews who believe Yeshua is the Messiah. My daughter, who is also not Messianic, was surprised when I told her I was planning on leaving my congregation. No, she'd never step foot in the door, but she knows that I (at least at one time) felt that it was the right place for me to be.

While I'd like to think I have friends among Messianic Judaism, at least in a "virtual" manner (since we've never met), I don't know what to do to make this "marriage" work. We were "forced" together by the Messiah and by the Apostles, but the Messiah's latter day Jewish disciples are having a hard time with us and all our "Gentile goofiness".

While a lot of people have become particularly angry lately over all these matters, I'm not angry at anyone. I feel disappointed and a little depressed at watching "the dream" die. I commented on Gene's blog that I had my doubts I'd be invited to the Matthew 8:11 feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. I know that Gene, Yahnatan, Derek, and a number of other blogosphere denizens have said I'd be welcome in their communities and that we could "break bread" together, but what about the rest of us? There are a lot of good people out there who frankly, just don't know any better. Yes, I've also met a lot of people who have "alternative" theological ideas that border on "cultish" and some people of questionable mental stability, but there are also many, many sane, responsible, compassionate, and loving people who are dedicated to the Jewish Messiah and who honor the living God. What about them?

If the "partnering" of Jews and Gentiles in the "Messianic" movement is like an intermarriage, then the relationship is in trouble. I get the feeling that my "partner" wants a divorce and never actually wanted to get "married" in the first place. Olitzky and Littman expose the challenges of a Jewish-Christian intermarriage, but they ultimately paint a picture of hope and welcome. For those of us who have a common devotion to the Jewish Messiah, do we dare hope at all? What will our life together look like in five, ten, or twenty years? Or will there be a "together" at all?

The road is long and often, we travel in the dark, ignoring the light of the world. Look for the lamp who lights your path or you may become lost in the dark forever.

"A Jew never gives up. We're here to bring Mashiach, we will settle for nothing less." -Harav Yitzchak Ginsburgh