16) Why Study the Bible Through a Jewish Lens? - Part 2: Restoring the Jewishness of Jesus
Introduction
In the last study, we began discussing why we should read the Bible through a Jewish lens. We started the conversation by looking at the historical and cultural reasons, addressing some of our long-held beliefs and biases that shape how we interpret the Bible. As we delve deeper into understanding the Jewish roots of our faith, we uncover a profound truth that challenges our preconceptions about Jesus. Often portrayed in ways that align more with our modern ideals than his historical reality, Jesus has been reimagined to fit various narratives. Yet, to truly grasp who Jesus was and is, we must rediscover his Jewishness. In doing so, we embark on a journey that enriches our understanding and reshapes our relationship with the scriptures and the God they reveal.
Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up?
We have stripped Jesus of his Jewish context, which raises the question, "Is the Jesus we worship truly the Jesus of the Bible?" He has been cast in each of our own images. To a non-Jewish eye, he has been everything from a philosopher to a social liberator to a counter-culture activist to a new-age guru. But what is the real, historic Jesus like?
Now more than ever, Jesus is love, nothing but love. The "He Gets Us" movement is the modern-day epitome of how Jesus has been redefined from his Jewish roots. According to this organization, Jesus is the most incredible love story ever told, and Jesus belongs to everyone. His teachings are described as a warm embrace without anything but unconditional love. On their "About Us" page from hegetsus.com, we see paragraph after paragraph defining who Jesus is but zero mention of his Jewish roots.
To be clear, I am not a proponent of placing Jesus in his Jewish context just to be historical or to create an excellent sidebar conversation from the actual message. Jesus' historical context is the conversation. I also don't mean the Jewish context is the conversation in the sense that he had to do the Jewish stuff "just because" or to "fulfill" the necessary requirements as the savior of the world. Too often, we see Jesus in the context of his Jewishness as "fulfilling" some mission to prove who he is or as a stepping stone to the message he wants to convey to the world. Basically, it paints a picture of Jesus as being Jewish only momentarily as a way to get to his true mission and purpose. This is not a good way of viewing Jesus or his message and, frankly, inconsistent with Jewish thought.
His Jewishness Revealed
Jesus was Jewish, and that changes EVERYTHING! Jesus was a Jewish man in every sense of the word. Born to Jewish parents and was circumcised on the 8th day according to the law of Moses. He kept the Biblical festivals and went to Passover every year as required by the law of Moses. He regularly attended synagogue on the Sabbath and read and interpreted the Jewish scriptures. Even as a young child, he was drawn to the Temple and conversed with the Jewish Sages. The Samaritan women at the well recognized him as a Jew due to his Jewish appearance and dress.
Jesus had a Jewish or Hebrew name. Unfortunately, even the name Jesus, which is popular in Christianity, has far removed him from his Jewish roots. His Hebrew name is Yeshua. Yeshua is the short version of the familiar biblical name Yehoshua or Joshua. Yeshua means salvation. By translating his name into Greek and further into English, we have stripped the Hebrew meaning from his name because the meaning is tied closely to Hebrew. As for "Christ," it is not a name at all. Christ comes from the Greek Christos, which means "anointed." It's a translation of the Biblical Hebrew title Mashiach (Messiah in English), meaning "anointed one."
The Jewish Rabbi and His Relationship to the Law of Moses
Jesus was a Jewish rabbi in every sense of the word. The term "rabbi" comes from the Hebrew word for "my master" or "my teacher." Like all rabbis, he taught Torah (the law of Moses). It is impossible to understand Jesus and his teachings properly apart from his first-century Jewish matrix. He spoke like a rabbi and taught like a rabbi. He used many well-known teaching methods of Israel's Sages. If a devout Jew was given and read the teachings of Jesus, they would be hard-pressed to see a difference between his teachings and the prophets of the Old Testament.
Replacement theology teaches that Jesus canceled the Torah (law of Moses). Replacement theology makes Jesus anti-Jewish. If we say that Jesus canceled the law, we introduce a conflict within scripture. Many Christians fail to realize the contradiction that develops when we say Jesus canceled the law. In fact, if Jesus teaches against the law of Moses (Torah), he automatically disqualifies himself as a prophet, teacher, and Messiah, according to Deuteronomy 13:
“If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the LORD your God is testing you, to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. You shall walk after the LORD your God and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice, and you shall serve him and hold fast to him. But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has taught rebellion against the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of slavery, to make you leave the way in which the LORD your God commanded you to walk. So you shall purge the evil from your midst. (Deuteronomy 13:1-5, ESV Bible)
What we see in Deuteronomy 13 is a warning from Moses to the Israelites. He says that prophets may come, and they may perform signs and miracles. And some of their predictions may even come to pass. However, suppose that the prophet tells you not to follow the commandments of God. In that case, they shall be put to death because they are teaching rebellion against God. This is a clear warning to the Jewish people and why teaching that Jesus canceled the Torah is such a big deal. I honestly believe that this is why many Jewish people have struggled to see Jesus as the true Messiah when the message comes to them from this perspective. When Christians tell a Jew that Jesus canceled the law, they are actually reinforcing the Jews's commitment to God by way of obeying Deuteronomy 13. Further, in teaching that Jesus did away with the law, we not only teach that he was a false prophet, we accuse ourselves of being false teachers as well.
And just before Jesus gave his infamous Sermon on the Mount, Deuteronomy 13 had to be in the back of his mind. Jesus was clear that he did not come to do away with the Torah in Matthew 5:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. (Matthew 5:17, ESV Bible)
Jesus said he did not come to abolish but to fulfill. Often, this saying is interpreted like this: "Jesus didn't come to abolish the Torah but to fulfill, and by fulfilling it, He has brought it to an end." That is not what he meant, and it is nonsensical. The word translated as abolish is often used in Jewish literature to mean "nullify the Torah." How would you fulfill the Torah? There are two ways this can be interpreted. One way it can be interpreted is by fulfilling the prophetic expectations. Okay, that might work for the prophets, but how would that fulfillment work for the Torah? So, the second way we could interpret this is the fulfillment of the Torah itself. How does that work?
Luckily, this is a common phrase that appears frequently in rabbinic literature near the time of Jesus. This is an example of why extra-biblical literature can be useful for interpreting the Bible. The Hebrew word is lekayem, which means to uphold, establish, fulfill, complete. or accomplish. When the term “fulfill” is used, it is an idiom, to speak of correctly interpreting the Torah so it can be properly kept. Similarly, “abolish” was the Hebrew word levatel or la’akor, which means to undermine by misinterpretation.
We see an example of this understanding in various sources. First, we see an example of this in the Mishnah (200 BCE to 200 CE):
If the Sanhedrin gives a decision to abolish (uproot, la'akor) a law, by saying for instance, that the Torah does not include the laws of Sabbath or idolatry, the members of the court are free from a sin offering if they obey them; but if the Sanhedrin abolishes (la'akor) only one part of a law but fulfills (lekayem) the other part, they are liable. (Mishnah Harayot 1:3)
Here is another example from Pirkei Avot 4:14:
Go away to a place of study of the Torah, and do not suppose that it will come to you. For your fellow disciples will fulfill it (lekayem) in your hand. And on your own understanding do not rely. (Mishnah Pirkei Avot 4:14)
Here we see an example in the Talmud:
Whoever fulfills the Torah in poverty, will fulfill it later on in wealth; and whoever abolishes the Torah in wealth, will abolish it later in poverty. (Pirkei Avot 4:9)
Another example:
If this is how you act, you have never in your whole life fulfilled the requirement of dwelling in a sukkah! (Mishnah Sukkot 2:7)
This idea of "abolishing" and "fulfilling" is rabbinic language, and many similar passages in rabbinic literature use the terms "abolish" and "fulfill" regarding the Torah. Often, "fulfilling" refers to correctly interpreting and applying the Torah. The one who "fulfills" it, upholds it, heeds its words, and carries them out. One who mishandles the Torah, misinterprets it, or fails to perform a commandment can be said to be annulling or abolishing the Torah. Fulfilling the Torah means to correctly interpret and observe the law. This is consistent with the expectations of a true prophet and teacher as outlined in Deuteronomy 13. Not only did Jesus verify his relationship to the Torah, he acknowledged the Torah's ongoing validity by stating:
For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:18-19, ESV Bible)
Not even the smallest Hebrew letter or a tiny part of a Hebrew letter can be removed from the Torah until heaven and earth pass away. I ask you, has heaven and earth passed away? The answer is obviously a resounding no! This is even more significant in the Jewish mind, as the passing of heaven and earth is seen as one age ending and another age beginning. This relates to common apocalyptic thoughts that we will explore more later. Suffice it to say the delineation between this age and the age to come is a significant concept to remember while reading scripture. Jesus' comment about "not until heaven and earth pass" is probably as strong a statement about the enduring and unending authority of the Torah as any rabbi has ever made. The remainder of the sermon on the mount is a prime example of Jesus "fulfilling" the Torah as he reveals its inner meanings.
The Gospels demonstrate many examples of Jesus confronting Jewish religious authorities. These arguments are the best evidence that Jesus remained thoroughly Jewish and within Judaism. We argue the most over details of religion and convictions only with those inside the same religion. He indeed criticized hypocrisy and religious pretentiousness when He saw it in the spiritual leaders of His day, but that's not the same as rejecting the whole religion of the Jewish people. In these arguments, he never once broke the law of Moses; if he did, he would be disqualified.
Jesus the Man
He was part man and part God. We are often guilty of emphasizing one of these over the other. Typically, we overemphasize Jesus as God. However, Jesus was so human that his own brothers and sisters did not come to faith in him as Messiah until after the resurrection. He had a family and had a job.
When we take the life of the man Jesus seriously, we will thoughtfully consider our lives and his call to discipleship seriously. Seeing Jesus as only God and "not of this world" only produces in our mind an infatuation with our supernatural origins as believers (being born again) and will define salvation in terms of our death (what happens when we die). Nothing is wrong with those things, but they are a small part of a bigger picture that tends to be overlooked or misinterpreted because we only see Jesus through that one lens.
Jesus' life as a man demonstrates that he struggled and had human problems like us. Who cannot relate to that? He also showed what living for God looks like, and he is the primary example of how we should model our lives as disciples.
Jesus the Messiah and Son of God
Messianic expectations were central to Judaism in the time leading up to and during Jesus' life. The Jewish people were awaiting a Messiah, a figure who would be a descendant of King David, who would bring about the redemption of Israel, restore the kingdom to its former glory, and usher in an era of peace and righteousness.
When Jesus came, many Jews were looking for a Messiah who would be an influential political and military leader who would overthrow the Roman occupation and establish a Jewish kingdom. However, Jesus' ministry and teachings were different from these expectations. He preached about the Kingdom of God being spiritual in nature, loving one's enemies, and needing repentance and spiritual renewal. That is not to say that the promises in the Old Testament were not going to, at some point, be physical in nature; the kingdom was not going to come through the military efforts of man.
The identification of Jesus as God is a central tenet of Christian belief. For Christians, Jesus is seen as fulfilling the messianic prophecies and as much more than a political or military leader. Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God, part of the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) and that through his life, death, and resurrection, he offers salvation and reconciliation with God to all who believe in him. Jesus, the Messiah, as God, has been a sticking point for the Jewish community. We will explore this more in later modules. We will demonstrate that the idea of the trinity and Jesus' Godly nature is entirely consistent with Jewish thought.
Summary
Revealing Jesus through a Jewish lens unveils a more authentic, multifaceted figure—a rabbi deeply rooted in Jewish tradition, a man who lived a fully human life, and the Messiah whose teachings transcend earthly kingdoms. Embracing his Jewishness honors his heritage and revitalizes our faith, grounding us in the rich tapestry of biblical truth. As we continue this exploration, may our hearts and minds be open to the transformative power of understanding Jesus in his original context, illuminating our path as followers of the Jewish Messiah. In the next lesson, we will start part 3 of our study, "Reestablishing the Torah and Its Relationship to the Sinai Covenant."