The Right Question

Greater is the promise made by the Holy One, Blessed be He, to the women than to the men, for it says, "Rise up, you women that are at ease; you confident daughters, give ear unto my speech" (Isaiah 32:9). Rav said to R. Hiyya, "Whereby do women earn merit? By taking their children to synagogue [to learn Scripture] and sending their husbands to the Beit HaMidrash [to learn Midrash], and waiting until they return from the Beit HaMidrash. -Gemara (17a)

I've been reading The Talmud for Beginners: Volume I Prayer by Rabbi Judith Z Abrams. One of the reviews for this book calls it a "good intro to the spiritual side of the talmud" and I can see a number of compelling themes, even for the Gentile believer, as I read through this text. One of the topics that attracted my attention is how the Gemara considers that Jewish men have a different and larger set of obligations to the Torah than Jewish women. Here's part of Rabbi Abrams' commentary:

This sugya deals with a different kind of interference that prevents one from reciting the Shema with the required intention. In the rabbis' view, being a woman interfered with one's ability to relate to God. They assumed that a woman was responsible for the demanding, and time-consuming, tasks of raising children and managing a household and therefore could not be held responsible for performing positive, time-bound commandments...

The purpose of this blog post is not to draw attention to the Talmudic differences between how Jewish men and women are bound to Torah obligations, but to illustrate how the sages considered that different roles and duties in Judaism affected the how different groups of Jews were obligated or not obligated to observe various commandments or mitzvot. Since I consider myself a voice in defense of Gentiles within the Messianic movement, I want to try and extend the allusion to Gentile Torah participation, including if or how Gentiles are obligated to the mitzvot. Here's more of what Rabbi Abrams has to say about a Jewish woman's obligations to the mitzvot and the exceptions to those obligations:

There are many exceptions to the rule of this system. Women are, in fact, obligated to perform some positive commandments, such as lighting the candles on Hannukah. Women are not forbidden to perform positive time-bound commandments; they are simply not obligated to do most of them...They may perform these mitzvot voluntarily if they wish to do so.

Because women are not obligated to do these mitzvot, the rabbis ruled that women cannot have the same intention and sense of responsibility regarding the mitzvot as men do...

I know that both Rabbi Abrams and the Talmudic sages were not considering Gentiles and particularly Gentile Messianics (Christians) in their writings. However, there is a natural extention to their opinions when you consider the debate within the Messianic movement regarding Gentile obligation or lack of obligation to the entire body of mitzvot. Traditional or non-Messianic Judaism believes that Gentiles (whether Christian or otherwise) are obligated by God to obey only the Seven Noahide Laws. While these seven laws may expand into numerous (perhaps hundreds of) subsets of laws, it is a much smaller list of the mitzvot than what Jews (Messianic or not) believe they are obligated to by the God who gave the Torah at Sinai.

What adds a wrinkle to the traditional Jewish viewpoint of Gentiles and the Noahide Laws is the fact that Messianic Jews, because they acknowledge Yeshua (Jesus) as the Jewish Messiah, must recognize that in some manner or fashion, Gentiles are allowed a greater access to God when they (we...I) accept the sovereignty of Yeshua over our lives. When we Gentiles become disciples of the Master (Matthew 28:18-20) and receive the Spirit of God in the same way as the Messianic Jews (Acts 10:44-48) our status, identity, and obligations relative to God, the Messiah, and the Bible are changed. The question is, what has changed and now much has it changed?

Many One Law groups bristle at the thought that Gentiles in the Messianic movement have a different (that is, lesser) set of obligations to the Torah than Jews, but at least as we see from the Talmudic viewpoint of Jewish men vs. Jewish women, there is sufficient precedence to believe (extending Talmudic opinion into the Messianic world) that Messianic Jews and Gentiles could operate under different Torah obligations. Of course, that brings up the issue of whether we can consider the rulings of the sages binding on Gentiles and Gentile Messianics typically don't acknowledge Talmudic authority. The Talmud as applied to Messianic Jews has been the topic of a recent Messiah Journal article I reviewed called Talmud on Trial (which amazingly enough, elicited absolutely no comments from the various interested parties...or "usual suspects") and I highly recommend that Gentile Messianics read the article to gain some illumination in this area.

Of course, even within Judaism, the idea of "allowed but not obligated", at least as it's applied to Jewish women, is not without its critics as Rabbi Abrams points out:

Some critics of this system contend that it is sexist and designed to exclude women from public religious life. Some traditional thinkers answer that this system was devised to help women by lessening the claims made on their already overcommitted time; the "mommy track" for mitzvot, as it were. They also contend that raising children is so spiritually elevating that women have less need of prayer.

Both groups of thinkers make valid points. There is no denying that the rabbis simply did not consider women full participants in Jewish religious life. In part, this is because they made assumptions about women's roles that no longer hold true...On the other hand, raising children is spiritually elevating...

Do Messianic Jews make assumptions about Gentile roles that are no longer true due to the fact that we've been grafted into the community by the blood of Yeshua and are now co-heirs? But I digress.

The focus on this blog does not allow me to completely outline Rabbi Abrams' observations on the differences in roles of Jewish men and women relative to the mitzvot, but you can see that agreement, even within Judaism, isn't universal on this point. Perhaps we can reasonably extend this to say that universal agreement within Messianic Judaism regarding the roles Jews and Gentiles have in terms of the mitzvot doesn't have to exist, either.

A recent comment on one of my other blog posts, The Unequal Yoke figures into the matter as well:

Instead, MJ's refocusing on serving the needs of the Jewish people will naturally do the work of sifting those who do not belong and are best served and can serve elsewhere, and those non-Jews who are truly and selflessly committed to Jewish people [specifically]...

Here Gene seems to be suggesting that the only valid reason for a Gentile to have a presence in a Messianic Jewish congregation is to service the needs of the Jewish people, rather than having any individual role in terms of worshiping and serving God. I'm not opposed to supporting Israel and in fact, I'm very much in favor of doing so, but do we not also have a role in directly having a relationship with the Jewish Messiah? Is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob not our God, too?

Rabbi Abrams has a similar comment to make in terms of how women are viewed in Judaism:

In our foregoing text, women are clearly seen as enablers, not as persons who perform mitzvot in their own right. Women are rewarded for enabling their children and husbands to study Torah, not for studying Torah themselves. However, the more women study Torah, the more genuinely committed they will be to sharing it with those they love. Helping someone else to study Torah without studying it oneself is like trying to enthusiastically urge them to eat something you've never tasted. Your exhortations may be effective, but they will be even more effective, and more sincere expressions of your love, if you know the sweetness your loved ones are about to enjoy.

I'm not automatically advocating that all Gentiles in the Messianic movement try their hardest to imitate a Jewish lifestyle at every single level, but one of the things that attracts Gentile believers to Hebraic worship and study is the beauty of that lifestyle. If we Gentiles are charged with supporting Jewish involvement in being Messianic and in allying ourselves with Israel as God's special chosen nation, can we not also have an individual and unique connection and worship of God in our own Gentile lives?

All that said, we Gentile Messianics must also give serious consideration to the intention of God and the teachings of the Messiah that were placed specifically upon the Gentile disciple, starting at Matthew 28. I've blogged extensively on the Matthew 28 mandate and how it is applied to Gentiles and have come up with a body of conclusions regarding Gentiles and the Torah. I'm finally getting the opportunity to turn those blog posts into a 15-part class that's available both to people in my local community and to anyone with Internet access who expresses an interest. I'm hoping this class with get both Jews and Gentiles in the Messianic movement to start questioning their assumptions (as I've been questioning mine) and to perhaps realize that none of us really "know it all".

Worship is pursuing the right questions, not in always pumping out "the right answers" like a scriptural slot machine.

That, Detective, is the right question. Program terminated.
Dr Alfred Lanning
I, Robot (2004)

The Unequal Yoke

Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? Or what does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God... -2 Corinthians 6:14-16

The Messianic Intermarriage Series

Update: December 6, 2010: As promised, Judah Gabriel Himango published his entry into this series today on this blog: Sweet Forbidden Jew-Gentile Love Makin'. Give it a read. Now, continue reading my original missive.

That's a terrible thing to say about a married couple! OK, I know Paul wasn't writing about married couples but rather issuing a warning against idolatry, but listen. He was cautioning members of the body of believers; the body of Messiah, to avoid going into partnerships or entering into relationships with unbelievers out of fear that such associations would lead the believers away from God and into idolatry (or back into idolatry, if applied to his Gentile audience). He wasn't wrong, either. Look at this:

While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with Moabite women, who invited them to the sacrifices to their gods. The people ate the sacrificial meal and bowed down before these gods. So Israel yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor. And the LORD’s anger burned against them. -Numbers 25:1-3

We see a very clear picture of how unequal interrelationship (and probably intermarriage) can lead the Jewish people away from God and into idol worship. This is why there is a such a strong prohibition against intermarriage in Judaism and why it's such a devastating tragedy that intermarriage and assimilation among the Jewish people today is so high. Consider this:

Rates of interreligious marriage vary widely: In the United States, they are just under 50%, in the United Kingdom, around 53%, in France, around 30%, and in Australia and Mexico, as low as 10%. In the United States, only about a third of children from intermarriages affiliate themselves with Jewish religious practice. The result is that most countries in the Diaspora have steady or slightly declining religiously Jewish populations as Jews continue to assimilate into the countries in which they live.

That's really terrible. What Hitler failed to do in the Holocaust could well be accomplished through Jewish intermarriage with Christians or secular Gentiles. It seems like unequal yoking is really dangerous in marriage. I'm a Gentile and my wife is Jewish! Should I divorce her for the sake of her Judaism?

To the rest I say this (I, not the Lord): If any brother has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her. And if a woman has a husband who is not a believer and he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him. For the unbelieving husband has been sanctified through his wife, and the unbelieving wife has been sanctified through her believing husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy. -1 Corinthians 7:12-14

Of course Paul goes out of his way to make sure we know this is his personal opinion and not a revelation from the Messiah, so we have to accept his words with that in mind. However, they are particularly applicable to my situation since I am a Gentile Christian (I consider myself "Messianic" but my wife thinks of me as a "Christian") and my wife is genetically, ethnically, and religiously (non-Messianic) Jewish. Here's some background.

When my wife and I were married, we were both secular with no faith basis between us at all. My parents raised me Lutheran (I left the church the first chance I got) while my wife's mother was Jewish and her father Christian Scientist. Both of my wife's parents walked away from their faiths before they were married, so my wife had no conscious connection to either faith group growing up. Only in adulthood did she discover her Judaism.

After we had children and moved to Idaho, we were lead to Christianity by the Spirit of God (through a highly unlikely series of events) and started attending a church. Neither of us felt like we really fit in and we kept asking questions (What happened to the Sabbath? How was the Law done away with? Why did God abandon the Jews?) no one could answer.

Through a fluke (or the Spirit of God), my wife discovered a local Messianic congregation (pretty much One Law, especially at that point) and she was hooked. While I eventually became attached to the Messianic congregation, my wife took all she could from the experience but remained unsatisfied. She still longed to establish a real relationship with the Jewish community and to live as a Jew. She started attending the Reform synagogue and for awhile, I attended with her and the kids. When the Chabad arrived in Boise, she began spending an increasing amount of time with them.

I'm not sure when she put aside her faith in Yeshua but it has become an accomplished fact. My children, who are all now in their early 20s, have varying degrees of a Jewish identity and none of them currently affiliate themselves with Christianity or the Messianic movement.

So here I am floating on a sea in a one-person raft.

But rather than intermarriage resulting in my Jewish wife and children being assimilated into Christianity or secular (non-Jewish) humanity, the reverse has happened. In spite of what Paul suggests in 1 Corinthians 7:12-14, do I still have a shot at "saving" my wife and bringing her back to an understanding of Yeshua as the Messiah? That's up to God. When I talk to her, my wife's acceptance of the Chabad Rabbi's teachings seems absolute. She has entered into Judaism wholeheartedly and, out of her four siblings, she is the only one to truly be Jewish. Whatever her original connection to Christianity once was, faith in Christ has gone the way of the Dodo bird.

As I consider our circumstances, I recall something else Paul said; something he said was from the Lord:

To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord): A wife must not separate from her husband. But if she does, she must remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. And a husband must not divorce his wife. -1 Corinthians 7:10-11

I previously wrote on the topic of intermarriage on my congregation's blog in Mixed and Does God Love Gentiles Too. Particularly in the latter blog post, some BE/MJ (Bilateral Ecclesiology/Messianic Judaism) folks had some pretty rough comments to make about me having the nerve to marry a Jew, as if I should divorce her for her own sake or even "take a long walk off a short pier". The comments in that latter blog post also were a large part of the reason why I started this personal blog, beginning with this post.

It's been just five months since I created this blog, and in one sense, I feel like I've covered a lot of territory. In another sense though, I feel like I'm still spinning my wheels. This is a blog, not only in search of a bridge between Gentiles and Jews in the Messianic world, but also a personal exploration of whether I, as a Gentile and an individual, have any place among Messianics or even in any faith community. My wife and I discovered we didn't fit into a traditional Christian church setting, but while she has found her place in the world, have I found mine?

This isn't generally known (until now), but a few people visiting my congregation have raised an eyebrow or two because my wife is worshiping in a Jewish synagogue while I'm teaching and assuming a leadership role in a Messianic congregation. Right before the High Holidays, I presented my concerns to the board. I offered them the opportunity to ask for my resignation if they felt that my position was not appropriate in terms of Paul's lessons in the Bible and the congregations' requirements (I should mention at this point that two of the board members, one Jewish and one Gentile, are widowed, while the other Jewish board member has a wife who attends a Christian church). The board's conclusion was that, while it would be very desirable and even required for a person in leadership to be unified with his or her wife in the faith, given our circumstances as a small congregation with limited resources, they affirmed that I had a significant and constructive role in the congregation's leadership.

So here I am...for now.

This all leads me to an unusual but possibly encouraging place:

Pharaoh said to Joseph, "I am Pharaoh; yet without you, no one shall lift up hand or foot in all the land of Egypt." Pharaoh then gave Joseph the name Zaphenath-paneah; and he gave him for a wife Asenath daughter of Poti-phera, priest of On. -Genesis 41:44-45

Before the years of famine came, Joseph became the father of two sons, whom Asenath daughter of Poti-phera, priest of On, bore to him. Joseph named the first-born Manasseh, meaning, "God has made me forget completely my hardship and my parental home." And the second he named Ephraim, meaning, "God has made me fertile in the land of my affliction." -Genesis 41:50-52

Joseph not only is given a completely Egyptian identity by Pharaoh as Viceroy over the land, but he marries an Egyptian noblewoman and has two children by his wife in Egypt. From all outward appearances, Joseph becomes the Egyptian "Zaphenath-paneah" and is second only to Pharaoh, King of Egypt, in power and authority.

If any guy had every reason in the world to assimilate after intermarriage, it was Joseph...but he didn't.

On the third day Joseph said to them, "Do this and you shall live, for I am a God-fearing man. -Genesis 42:18

Of course, the word Joseph uses for "God" is the "generic" God, but I don't believe there's a scholar on earth, Jewish or Christian, who would think that Joseph had given up his Jewish identity or abandoned his devotion to the God of the Hebrews to become an Egyptian idolater. In fact, it was God who continually blessed Joseph and all that he did for the sake of the Children of Israel and the world. Joseph, despite what must have been enormous temptations to do otherwise, remained faithful to God and lived a life dedicated to God's purpose...

...even though he married a non-Jew in a foreign land, had children with his non-Jewish wife, raised his children in a non-Jewish land, and lived the outward lifestyle of an Egyptian nobleman.

I'm not saying that every Jew should marry a non-Jew, even when both are Messianic, but I am saying that when such marriages exist among you, the Gentile involved is not automatically trying to take the Judaism out of the Jew. We Gentiles in intermarriages are not evil, horrible, anti-Semitic monsters, and we are not trying to eliminate the Jewish presence on the earth (not that God would allow it, even if we had such a goal).

Judah Gabriel Himango and I have agreed to post a series of blogs on the topic of Jewish-Gentile intermarriage within the Messianic community. This is my opening article as part of the project and over the next few weeks, we'll be blogging back and forth and linking our blog posts to each other in the hope that opening such a dialogue will serve to shed some light on a particular reality. There is intermarriage in the Messianic world and in fact, intermarriage may be especially unavoidable and inevitable within the Messianic community, much more so than in the general world population. This is because, by definition, you have Jews and Gentiles worshiping the same God and the same Messiah within the same context and often, within the same congregation.

What are we going to do about it?

Addendum: I'm posting a link to a document written by David Rudolph, Ph.D. called Intermarriage Statistics. It contains some very illuminating information about the details and results of intermarriage between Jews and Gentiles. Worth the read.