Okay, now I *do* have a Jewish-related question.

[conuly]

I vaguely know who the Jews for Jesus and Messianic Jews are. I'm curious, though - the few times I've heard them mentioned, it's been with some hostility. Why?

Comments

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

To quote from (well, paraphrase from memory) the son of a rabbi I know:

"You know who the Jews for Jesus are? Do ya? Let me tell you what a Jew for Jesus is. He's a Christian, that's what. He's not Jewish! If you're gonna be Christian, fine. Some of my best friends are Christians. But Christians aren't Jews. Jews are still waiting for the Messiah."

[conuly]

Well, in the early days of Christianity there were Christian Jews.

Nice icon, btw.

[conuly]

Or perhaps the were jewish christians, whatever.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

In the early days of Xtianity, it was a minor offshoot of a religion that had had many minor offshoots already. There also hadn't been two millennia of terms such as "Christ killer" thrown about. I'd think that such history would have to influence many people's attitudes, and that's not even counting in the strong evangelical nature of the Jews for Jesus group, which is reportedly quite unpleasant.

[readerravenclaw.livejournal.com]

The earlest "christians" were all Jews.

[conuly]

Well, yes, but I'm talking about a specific early Christian movement.

[readerravenclaw.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I see that now; I was emphasizing the wrong part of your sentence in my head. :)

The thing is that originally, the Christians really did sort of act like Jews - kept most of the same laws, and so forth - which is NOT the case now. Also, in the beginning, all non-Jews who wanted to become Christian actually had to convert (sort of) to Judaism.

But even that isn't really the point. The point is that a small group of Jews claimed to be representing the "true" Jewish belief, and that segmenet broke off and underwent transformations to such a point that it was no longer recognizable as Jewish, and grew until it vastly outnumbered the original, core Jews. You can imagine that those core Jews aren't pleased when what was once that tiny minority of Jews returns - now transformed into billions of non-Jews - and claims to represent "real" Judaism.

[celticess.livejournal.com]

I wondered that myself the first time I heard the term "Jews for Jesus." I thought if they believe in Jesus aren't they Christian? Or perhaps more correctly some orthadox christian sect.

I've never run into that term until the web. Though I had heard on occasion Messanic Jews. But no idea what they are either. I figured they were some orthadox subgroup.