cross‐posted (heh) from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/4960299
It was only one century ago that many would have been shocked to hear the phrase ‘Jesus was a Jew’, as it simply wasn’t something that ordinary churches enjoyed teaching. While a few premodern Christians (including the infamous Protestant pioneer Martin Luther, who responded with a massive wall of text after Jews kept telling him ‘nah, I’m good’) were aware of this knowledge, evidently nobody was really in the habit of emphasizing it either — quite the opposite of the current situation, where the phrase ‘Jesus was a Jew’ has become a cliché.
Since many churches considered anti‐Judaism part of their job, it made sense that they would have wanted to keep quiet about J.C.’s Jewish background, as it would have inevitably raised all sorts of awkward questions, e.g. ‘If Jesus was Jewish, why don’t we all convert to Judaism?’ However, since some Christians feel guilty about nearly two millennia of violent Christian anti‐Judaism, including the Shoah, and many other Christians want to show their support for Zionism, the teaching that J.C. was Jewish has switched from being an arcane detail to basic knowledge.
Now, certainly not all who repeat this trivia are directing it to Jews. In fact, a decade ago I usually saw it directed at blatantly antisemitic Christians, though I doubt that it was always persuasive (as one ‘political pastor’ painfully learned in 1939). This counterargument is also a little irksome in its own way, as J.C.’s Jewish background should not be the only, or even the main, reason why somebody should respect contemporary Jewish people. The paradox of Jews inspiring two overwhelmingly gentile faiths does fascinate me, but Jewish people have worth aside from that.
In any case, if you have been lurking Jewish communities for a while then you have likely noticed that when Jews mention this phrase, they tend to mention it unhappily. It isn’t just that the phrase has become cliché and pedantic, but mainly because the intentions behind it are almost always misguided. At best, telling Jews that J.C. was Jewish is only a quite minor, woefully inadequate way of expressing solidarity. At worst, it is an evasive rhetorical trick, basically the Christian equivalent to saying ‘I’m not racist, I have a black friend!’ or ‘I’m part Cherokee!’, hence why somebody deemed the phrase antisemitic. I find both of those authors harsh, personally, so this is my attempt at putting it more gently if anybody finds their tones too off‐putting.
While it delights me to see Christians who are sincerely interested in demonstrating solidarity with Jewish people, I suspect that all Jews would agree (for once) if I said that reminding others of J.C.’s Jewish background isn’t enough. Maybe better than nothing, but it still isn’t enough. How, then, should one go about it? Click here for my suggestions, zero of which involve supporting an antidemocratic régime! Evangelicals, take note! And if you want to discuss Christianity’s Jewish roots in a way that actually sounds sophisticated and interesting, Torah Praxis after 70 C.E.: Reading Matthew and Luke–Acts as Jewish Texts is arguably the way to get serious about understanding them. See? Christianity’s Jewish origins don’t have to sound like boring trivia!
If you tell a Jewish person that J.C. was a Jew, the politest response that you’ll get is simply ‘good for him’. Few people want to bluntly tell you ‘I don’t care’, let alone patiently and respectfully explain to a stranger why they find this knowledge irrelevant, so this my contribution for anybody who needed help. Hopefully I articulated this well!
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I’m not Jewish. But the Jews for Jesus people are aggressive and terrible. If I was Jewish, I’d hate the volume of aggressive evangelical proselytising.
I once met a chud who belonged to one of those organizations. Didn’t know anything about Jewish or Christian history.
The vibe I get is that the director is always the son of non-religious Jewish parents (thus technically Jewish) who converts because he marries a Christian woman, and nearly all of the underlings are evangelical Christians.
I think he’s Italian, so it’s likely his family falls into the latter category.
No doubt many Christians who continue to proselytise to Judaists sincerely believe that they are only doing them a favour and saving them from damnation, so I would ask them three questions:
- Do you agree that G‐d is the author of reason?
- Do you agree that G‐d endowed you with reason?
- Is your sense of reason telling you that it is both fair and logical that its author would send a wise and kindly rabbi like the Baal Shem Tov to an eternity of unimaginable anguish all because he said ‘no’ to the Christian offer of salvation?
There are more than a few Christians, even Evangelicals, who agree that an eternal penalty simply for turning down Christian salvation is unreasonable. Rabbi Michael Skobac mentioned in an interview with him that many Christians wrote to an Evangelical magazine asking if G‐d sent millions of Shoah victims to Hell. The best that the magazine could say was suggest that some of them might have repented at the last minute. That is barely any better than proposing that sinners simply send theirselves to Hell.
I have a better response: the typical conception of Hell clearly does not cohere with reason. Even if the Almighty sentenced millions thither for their unbelief alone, it would be more reasonable to suggest that they could still repent even if they ‘missed the deadline’; scripture says that the Almighty is most forgiving. Alternatively, it could be a state of sheer obliteration or nonexistence rather than anguish. A common Jewish conception of Gehenna or ‘Hell’, a purification that lasts for a maximum of twelve months, would also be more reasonable.
How can Evangelical adults be sure that the most unreasonable conception of Hell is also the only correct one? They are not slaves to their theology. If they refuse to think over it, or if they try to think over it yet stay with their absurd beliefs, then the theology is not the problem here. They are making a political decision. Because in my view—and maybe you’ll agree—the typical conception of Hell unravels with minimal scrutiny. Just by thinking about it!
it made sense that they would have wanted to keep quiet about J.C.’s Jewish background, as it would have inevitably raised all sorts of awkward questions, e.g. ‘If Jesus was Jewish, why don’t we all convert to Judaism?’
that doesn’t make any sense to me, Christians view themselves as a successor religion to Judaism, they believe that Jesus showed up and released Judaism 2.0, they don’t hide that Jesus was a Jew, in fact there is a lot of preaching about Jesus showing up and changing things. The only functional purpose of “converting to Judaism” is to stop believing in Jesus, which is either an ideological regression and/or heresy to your average Christian. To Christians, Jews simply have not heard the “good news” or have rejected the son of God.
Now if you wanted to continue to believe in Jesus, but also consider yourself a follower of Judaism, there is a sect called Messianic Jews.
Why some Jewish people are annoyed by the phrase ‘Jesus was a Jew’
I can image this phrase being very annoying. From the perspective of Judaism, this is like having a favorite movie/tvshow/book, then one random day an unauthorized fanfiction sequel gets more popular. It introduces a new character who completely rewrites the lore and rules of the universe in bullshit ways and is a total marty sue. It’s only popular with people who’ve never read your favorite book, but you can’t talk about your favorite book without people presuming you’re talking about the unauthorized fanfiction sequel. Your favorite work of fiction is completely colonized by non-canon non-sense fake fans who have literally no respect for the source material. And they outnumber you 100-to-1.
I can see it coming across the way “He’s your president, too” might come across. Very disrespectful and insulting.
that doesn’t make any sense to me
It is a question that some people seriously ask. Many Christians believe that (attempting to) imitate התלוי is a good idea, and if one took that to its logical conclusion, one would also convert to Judaism.
they don’t hide that Jesus was a Jew
Of course not, but (as I explained in my post!) it used to be rare for Christians to openly acknowledge the hanged one’s Jewishness. Many premodern Christians (mostly upper‐class ones) despised Judaism, misportraying Jews as not only a fossilized people but also extremely sinful, descending from Christicides, desecrating Christian properties, poisoning wells, blaspheming, ritually murdering gentile children, and so forth, and claiming that Jews exhibited repulsive features such as horns, a stench, menstruation irrespective of their sex, and the like.
Therefore, emphasizing the hanged one’s Jewishness would have resulted in all sorts of uncomfortable implications, including the implication that his disputes with his compatriots were not a simple, black‐and‐white matter of Jew vs. gentile, but a Jewish tradition that stretches from ancient times to today: infighting. Many gentile rulers found it useful to misportray Jews as perfectly united, as that justified indiscriminate oppression against them.
Now if you wanted to continue to believe in Jesus, but also consider yourself a follower of Judaism, there is a sect called Messianic Jews.
Those Herzlians are pretty much the laughingstock among proper Judaists. I’ve read that not only is their knowledge of Judaism poor, they even mistreat Judaists!
A better example would be some of the marranos. I actually watched a documentary about them a few weeks ago, and in it they interviewed a Jew who seriously said that she practised both Judaism and Christianity. Many Judaists who adopted Christianity under official pressure formed ‘neo‐Ebionite’ sects (though there wasn’t literally a continuity between the Ebionites and these later Judeo‐Christians), and it was common for them to reject both Trinitarianism and the belief that G‐d begat a son.
From the perspective of Judaism, this is like having a favorite movie/tvshow/book, then one random day an unauthorized fanfiction sequel gets more popular.
I have seen some disgruntled Judaists disparage the New Testament as ‘fan fiction’ before, so I know what you mean.
