The term Jew is related to Judah, Jacob's fourth son from Leah. Judah1 means praise to the Lord. His mother Leah wanted to express her gratitude to the Lord for giving her this fourth son. The descendants of Judah were aware of this deviation, and sometimes were reminded of it by descendants of other tribes challenging them to live up to their name.

   Some Jews did succeed in assimilating with their Gentile neighbors through intermarriage. change of name, and deniel of their identity. Usually it took several generations to achieve.  On the other hand, there were groups and individuals who, though not descendants of Judah, or from any of the other tribes of Israel, succeeded in their efforts at being absorbed into the people called Jews.

   The people of Shechem wanted to become Jewish and even went through the full rite of circumcision of every male, yet were slaughtered and never penetrated the hermetically sealed tribes of Israel. Sometimes those attempting to join them gave them trouble, like the "mixed multitude,"2 and the Gibeonites. 3  However, in most other cases, these non-Jewish groups seem to have been gradually absorbed and assimilated into the Jewish body by intermarriage.4 Large influxes took place in the Persian period, as reported in the book of Esther in the Bible, and in the Maccabean period, when whole tribes under threat of extermination, preferred circumcision.  The most prominent are the Khazar tribes of central Russia who accepted Judaism. The story of their conversion was described and popularized by the famous philosopher/poet Yehuda Halevi.

   Today, both in Israel and in the Diaspora, Rabbis are working hard at teaching and preparing prospective converts to Judaism.  In some cases. at least, these converts are absorbed into the Jewish mainstream by intermarriage.

Messianic Jews
   Among the 18 million Jewish people there is a group of perhaps twenty or thirty thousand people (editor note: 200,000 plus today some say), born Jews, who believe in the Torah and the rest of the Tenach and practice Jewish customs. They also believe in Jesus. Some, if not most of them, prefer to call Him by His Jesus name, Yeshua.  Although small in number, they are a vocal group, constantly challenging the Jewish spiritual and secular authorities with their presence, demanding recognition as Jews.

   It would be easiest for these Jewish believers to accept the advice of rabbinic leaders and put aside belief in Yeshua.  The Jewish authorities work very hard to achieve it. Organizations and individuals spend their time and hundreds and thousands of dollars towards this end. Among the best known are the Pe’ilem, Keren Yeladdenu, supported by the Ministry of Religious Affairs in Israel and Jews for Judaism in the United States, who do it as a full or part time job.

   Why do Messianic Jews resist? What lies behind their obstinacy, not only continuing to believe themselves but also spreading their faith to others? The answer is spiritual.  This spiritual aspect can be summarized.

Prophecies Demand It
   Yeshua is Messiah because He alone gives sense to the words of our Jewish prophets. There is Isaiah 53 with its minute description of the suffering servant who was despised and rejected, afflicted with pain and stripes, by whose “stripes we are healed.”  He then dies, is buried, yet is revived and suffers all this “for the affliction of my (lsaiah the prophet's) people. " All this can best be applied to one person only - Yeshua of Nazareth.  The Talmud teaches that this chapter refers to Messiah. The targum of Jonathan begins the passage with the words, Ha yatslakh avdee Mashikha, "Behold my servant the Messiah shall prosper. ..."  Common sense says it must refer to Yeshua.  The same is true for many other prophecies which speak of the time of His birth, like Daniel 9:26:

                       The maner of His birth in a supernatural way is recorded in Isaiah 7:14:

                       Isaiah 9:65 says:

                       The place of his birth is foretold by Micah, the prophet in verse 5:26

                       The manner of His death is found both in Psalm 22:17,

   We have heard arguments against His Messianic claims by the fact that some prophecies like Isaiah 2 (breaking swords into plowshares) and Isaiah 11 (lamb and lion dwelling together) have not been fulfilled as yet and that our explanations for a future fulfillment by His second coming creates too long a hiatus (of close to 2,000 years). But what is 2,000 years in the sight of God, waiting patiently for His people to respond and accept His Anointed One - Yeshua, ben Elohim?

Personage Spotless
   We hold on to our faith because of the spotless Person He was. His contemporaries testified of Him that "He doeth all things well. "9 He could challenge his contemporaries saying to them, "which of you convicted me of sin?" and they held their peace. Some modern Jewish and non-Jewish scholars point out His lack of originality in many of His sayings. Would it have been better if He had contradicted the words of the prophets?   Others assert that His teaching is too idealistic (e.g., the turning of the other cheek), and therefore impractical. But who can find fault in a Man who constantly goes from the south to the north of Israel, then Judea and Samaria, doing good, healing the sick, cleansing the lepers, opening the eyes of the blind, unstopping the ears of the deaf, making the lame to walk again and preaching good news of salvation to the poor, the needy, and the outcast?  Rejected by the leading Pharisees and by the High Priests, He died a martyr's death by crucifixion at the hands of the Roman soldiers.

   But this is not the end of the story, for His 12 disciples plus a number of others, see Him alive after He died and proclaimed Him the risen Saviour. For this assertion nearly all of them had to pay with their lives, dying like their master a cruel death by hands of pagans and of unbelieving Jewish leaders. Yet these  believing Jews never flinched.  They knew for sure that He is alive.

   We are convinced that He is Messiah because of the transformation in the personalities of His followers. Who could transform Simon Bar Yonah(Peter), the fisherman on the shores of Galilee, to become the leader of Messianic Jews in Israel and abroad, and finally to be acknowledged the first bishop and highest authority next to Yeshua by millions of people of the whole world?

   What about Saul of Tarsus, convinced that he, with the letters he had from the High Priest, would completely knock out all belief in Yeshua? He met the risen Yeshua on the road from Jerusalem to Damascus,10 and from a persecutor of the Gospel he became a proclaimer of the Good News.  He himself was greatly persecuted by unbelieving people everywhere until he finally died a martyr's death at the hands of the Romans in the time of Nero.

People Who Accepted Him
   From the first book, Bereshit(Genesis), to the last prophet in the Tenach (OT), Malachi, the Messiah's activity involves "the people” or the nations. Yaacov Aveenoo(Jacob) foresees it and says:

                       Isaiah11 the prophet sees Him as the

                       Malachi12 says of Him:

Peace That Messiah Gives
   Jewish believers in Messiah Yeshua found that only in Him they have rest, peace, and satisfaction. They heard Messiah’s invitation. "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”13  They verified it in their own lives.  They read the record of His promise, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” 14  They found Messiah to be the Great Gentleman who always keeps His promise. The result is that we can say together with one of the first hasidim of Messiah Yeshua, Simon bar Jonah, called Simon Peter:

References:
 1 Yehuda   2 Exodus 12:38   3 Joshua 9    4 Sanhedrin 98 5 v.5 in the Hebrew text  
6  v.1 in the Hebrew text 7 In the Masoretic text it reads "Like a lion they are at my hand and my feet"   
8 Sukkah 52   9 Mark 7:37   10 Acts 9   11 Isaiah 11.10   12 Malachi 1:11 
13 Matthew 11:28  14 John 14:27  15 John 6:68-69

What The Rabbis Know  About The Messiah
  by Rachmiel Frydland
Reprinted With Permission of the
Messianic Literature Outreach
6161 Busch Blvd., Suite 205 Columbus, Ohio 43229
 

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