Jewish Christians
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Comment by Caleb on February 4th, 2009 at 11:47 pm
As a Christian for more than 30 years your article titled: “Jewish Christians” is misleading because one cannot be a Jew and a Christian at the same time. Peter, John, James, Philip and others were not Jews Converts. They were Galileans. They were not Essenes as you wrongly asserted. They were a New Creation in Christ. They had no traditions so they established in the Council in Jerusalem the fundamentals of the Christian Faith. This process took several centuries even after the Apostles had left through the ecumenical Councils of the Church.
They left behind a body of writings that have no equal anywhere in all of History. Under the Kingship and Lordship of Jesus Christ the Beastly Roman Empire was destroyed (ACTS 17:7). The early Christians did not preach a religious system. They proclaimed the Kingdom of God in righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” even as the Master Himself told the Jews “If I by the Spirit of God cast out demons then the Kingdom of God has come upon you.” The Jews missed the Kingdom of God when God poured out His Holy Spirit upon His redeemed from Old Israel on the Day of Pentecost in Jerusalem to form the New Israel of God. The Jews missed out then and continue to do so today.
You get it all wrong to connect the Christian Faith with some unknown Jewish denomination called the Essences. There is absolutely no link between Christians and the Jewish Essences theologically, spiritually or otherwise.
What I see on your website is another Zionist propaganda website set up to confuse Christians and to destroy the Christian Faith because the Christian Faith produced Christian Civilization in the West. Milton Viorst had written in “The Great Documents of Western Civilization” : “Western Civilization was born of Christianity”: Not Judaism. Jews just took over the institutions and systems of Western Civilization in Europe and America by deception and they are wrecking the World because Jesus said “The Kingdom of God will be taken from you (JEWS) and given to a nation that bears the fruits thereof.” That New Nation is the Christian Church because the Christian Church is the Bride, the Wife of the Lamb which is the New Jerusalem that comes down from Heaven so that Christians have come to Mt. Zion (Hebrews 12:22-24)
Your attempts to Judaize the Christian Faith is appalling to say the least. The Christian Faith is founded in Jesus Christ not some Jewish Sect called the ESSENCES.
JEWS ARE NOW CONVERTING TO CHRIST AND ACKNOWLEDGING HIM AS KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS, THE HIGH PRIEST OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH BASED ON THE OLD TESTAMENT AND THE NEW TESTAMENT.
Time has come for you to repent and submit yourself unconditionally to Jesus Christ of Nazareth the Man of Galilee who came to His own but His own received Him not but as many as received Him to them gave He the power to become the sons of God who were born not of the flesh, nor the will of man but of God.” Nicodemus a Rabbi was told by Jesus Christ of Nazareth: “You must be born again.” That same word is for you as well because only those ‘BORN OF THE SPIRIT WILL ENETR THE KINGDOM OF GOD IN THE HOLY SPIRIT” TO RULE AND REIGN WITH CHRIST IN THE MIDST OF THEIR ENEMIES. Make sure you are not one of their enemies because Jesus Christ is the Cornerstone rejected by the Jews and He is precious in the sight of God as the Beloved Son of God. If you fall on that Cornerstone you will be broken and if the Cornerstone falls on you you will be crushed. Either way you lose.
Even as the Apostle Paul reaffirming what the Prophet Isaiah wrote in isaiah 49:8-9 by declaring “Behold Now is the accepted time. Behold! Now is the day of Salvation! ( 2 Corinthians 6:2) so the Kingdom Age of the Messiah: Jesu Christ has come.
You have no eternity here so why waste time/
Caleb
Comment by Dan Fefferman on February 5th, 2009 at 9:58 am
Caleb:
Thanks for your comment. I’m afraid I will have to disagree with you on the question of whether the apostles you mention were Jews. As you rightly point out, they, like Jesus, were Galileans, but this does not mean that they were not also Jews. Galilean was their regional identity, Judaism was their religion. I would agree that they may not have been strictly observant Jews and that they accepted Jesus as the Messiah and rejected the traditional Jewish understanding of the Messiah’s role, but again, this does not mean that they stopped being Jews. Indeed there a strong indication in the Book of Acts that Jerusalem church members went out of their way to maintain good relations with the Temple authorities. Even Paul, who was from farther afield than Galilee insisted “I am a Jew, from Tarsus in Cilicia” (Acts 21:39) Moreover, Acts 6:1 refers to both Greek and Hebrew Jews comprising the congregation of the Jerusalem church when Stephen, a Greek Jew, was appointed as deacon. Acts 21:20 tells “how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law,” indicating that these believers in Christ continued to practice the Jewish law, which is what is meant by the term Jewish Christians. This and much more points to the fact that many members of the early Christian church, including its first leaders, identified themselves as Jews after becoming Christians and are called Jews in the Bible.
Regarding the Essenes, I’m not sure where you get the idea that our article equated the Jewish Christians and Essenes (which you spell Essences). There is such a theory, but I do not hold to it, and our article does not mention it. Indeed, the word Essene or Essence does not appear in the article. As to the issue of attempting the Judaize Christianity, I can assure that our concern in this article is to represent the facts concerning the article’s topic, not to take a stand on a theological issue.
Best Regards, Dan Fefferman
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