Are Jewish observances okay for a believer in Yeshua to keep? Do they offer us any advantage? Should we go by the premise that because Jews do not accept Yeshua as the Messiah, we should have nothing to do with their observances or writings?
Who Are the Jews We're Supposed to Go?
Okay, I’ve heard enough of Jews who are not Jews, the Jews in the land being Kazareans and rich and powerful banksters, and the Jews who are of the synagogue of Satan. Who’s left? Who is ‘the Jew’ that we’re supposed to bring the Gospel to first?
For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
Romans 1:16
We’d rather avoid them all like the plague along with all their Jewish stuff, because they’re evil and not saved. But that’s the very reason we’re supposed to go to them with the power of the Gospel – so they get saved and would come to know Yeshua as the Messiah many of them have been looking for. As fishers of men, what bait could we use to catch the souls of the Jews, whoever they are?
Seems like we like to place the emphasis first on distressing those evil Jews, but are there any Jews who do good we’d like to see honored? Paul addressed this partiality:
There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of a man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek, but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For there is no partiality with God. Romans 2:9-11
What do the Scriptures say to identify the Jews of the tribe of Judah in our day?
The Shema: An Identifier for the House of Judah
The Shema has been the bedrock of Judaism for millennia and is widely accepted as part of what defines a Jew. Throughout their history, the Shema has been the central prayer of a Jewish prayer book. One identifying characteristic of a Jew is their daily recital of the Shema. I believe Yeshua confirmed that, as we’ll see later.
One way I know that the Jews of the tribe of Judah were slaughtered in the Holocaust was that their last words were singing the Shema. One way the Nazis identified Jewish children was by having a group sing it. They would separate the ones who placed their hands over their eyes concerning their ancestral observance.
Being a Jew during World War II didn’t appear to have an advantage. What about today?
What advantage then has the Jew? Or what profit is there in circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. Romans 3:1-2
One of those oracles that the house of Judah has always been committed to was ‘The Shema.’ The saying of the Shema is a witness. In one of the jots and titles of Moses, the enlarged letters ayin and dalet together spell the word ‘ahd,’ which means witness
What or who does ‘The Shema’ bear witness to? The letter ayin is an eye, the dalet – a door. Together they mean ‘to eye the door,’ ‘to see the door.’ Yeshua said that He is the Door (John 10:7) and that He is the only Way to the Father (John 14:6). He also told us that if we’ve seen Him, we’ve seen the Father, fulfilling the witness of ‘The Shema.’ The Jews have been blinded in part for our sake, so let’s not be conceited (Romans 11).
The Statement of Faith and the House of Joseph
What would assemblies in the other house of Israel say to be the bedrock of their identity? What would be central in their writings describing to the world who they are?
Many of those who identify as the people of the God of the Bible, who definitely do not identify themselves as Jews, commonly point to the name of their congregation and their statement of faith when asked for an identifier.
Back when we had identified ourselves as Christians, Leslie and I put a sign up by our house that said, ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved’ (Acts 16:31). We wanted everyone to know that we were obedient to the biblical command to believe on Jesus and that He was our Lord. Nothing wrong with that, it’s all good!
The verse in the Bible quoted most often by Christians goes right along with that command to believe in Jesus:
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
John 3:16
Most Christians call themselves believers in Jesus. Yes, and so are we. Now we call Him by His Hebrew Name – Yeshua. Faith in Yeshua is essential and is certainly a major part of our identity. Our Statement of Faith proclaims our faith in Him.
Yeshua and the Shema
What did Yeshua say was the greatest commandment? Did He say that everyone must believe in Him to be the greatest commandment for all His followers to keep? What was the bedrock commandment that our Master proclaimed?
One of the Bible scholars of Yeshua’s day challenged Him with that same question, while He was debating with the religious rulers of His day. One of the Torah scholars (scribes) asked Him, “Which commandment is first of all?” (Mark 12:28)
Since Yeshua is the Living Word, could He not have given the command that they all must believe in Him? Didn’t He know that if He referred to a commandment in the Torah and the Elohim of the TaNaKh that He could have reinforced the Jewish religion? Wouldn’t quoting a text out of the Torah, which was widely known to be the bedrock of Judaism, dissuade the religious people of the day from seeing Yeshua as ‘the Way, the Truth and the Life?’ What was our Master’s answer?
Yeshua answered, “The first is, ‘Shema Yisrael, YHWH Eloheinu, YHWH echad. (Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.) Mark 12:29
One thing I believe our Jewish Messiah was doing here was that He confirmed His identity and His connection with the Jews. Of course, that’s not the main point, so let’s consider other ramifications of this major proclamation of our Messiah Yeshua.
The Greatest Commandment to Keep for Jews and Joes
What is the first and foremost commandment to keep? For Israel, not just the Jews, not just the Joes, for all of Israel to hear that YHWH is our God and that our God is One. Since this commandment is of such great importance, I’ve often pondered just what it means for us ‘to hear’ from the Spirit of Truth that YHWH is our God and that He is One.
What does it mean in Hebrew ‘to hear,’ that is, to ‘Shema’? According to Jeff Benner’s Ancient Hebrew Lexicon, this word means ‘Obedience: A careful hearing of someone or something as well as responding appropriately in obedience or action.’
That means we aren’t to just hear to store facts in our heads but to hear and internalize the Word in our hearts to obey and do His words. What does ‘YHWH our God, YHWH is One’ have to do with obedience? What does the Spirit of Truth say about YHWH being our ‘God’?
The title ‘God’ in English is pretty abstract and hard to understand. The paleo-Hebrew pictographs of the root word for God, ‘El’ spelled ‘Alef, Lamed,’ pictures a powerful ox head with authoritative horns and a shepherd’s staff, a staff of authority. Together the letters for ‘El’ picture ‘a Mighty Authority,’ ‘a Strong Controller.’
In the context of the hearing, the lamed can also picture a tongue, the staff of authority controlling the body and the affairs of life by what is spoken, to be heard and obeyed.
The Shema command is to first acknowledge and humbly submit to the authoritative, mighty Word of our God and to allow Him to be the Strong Controller of our hearts. No man, no soul, not even self is to be the mighty authority to whom we submit and obey. No other god are we to allow control of our hearts, emotions, words, and actions. YHWH comes first as our God and Lord. Let Elohim hold and try the reins of our hearts.
The child of God must acknowledge and submit to YHWH our God being the One and Only to obey. Yeshua has to be One with God, for His disciples to call Him Master and submit to His authoritative voice. He is the ‘Lord Yeshua,’ Whom we submit to as our Master. That YHWH is God and that He is One is to say that Yeshua is God and that He is One with the Father. Yeshua said that when we see Him, we see the Father. When we hear and obey the Divine Messiah, we hear and obey the Father.
The Shema and the Love of God
And you shall love YHWH your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”’ Mark 12:30-31
We sure like to love one another in our Hebrew circles. But I wonder where our love and appreciation for the House of Judah went? Where did the disdain come from for them being so evil and getting all their doctrines so wrong? Don’t they do anything right?
“Right, Teacher,” the scribe said to Him. “You have spoken the truth, that He is one, and besides Him, there is no other!” Mark 12:32
Hey, the scribes and Pharisees got something right after all! Yeshua and the scribe agreed that the Shema and the V’ahavtah were the greatest two commandments, the bedrock upon which our relationship with YHWH and one another stands. Yeshua did not come up with anything different than what the religious leaders were already teaching and what Jews proclaimed daily. Straight from the Torah, the Jewish Messiah did not repudiate but affirmed this identifying characteristic of who a Jew truly is.
This account doesn’t say that the scribe believed in Jesus. But Yeshua did commend him for his wise answer and how close He was to the Kingdom:
When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, “You are not far from the Kingdom of God.” Mark 12:34
Do we see any Jews or Torah scholars in Judaism as being ‘not far from the Kingdom’ due to their allegiance to the Shema and the One and Only True God? Are there Jews who truly strive to love God and their neighbors as themselves?
Who are we to judge whether Jews are way far from the Kingdom, the ‘synagogue of satan’, or not? Maybe we should try to believe the best about them out of love for our brothers in the house of Judah.
That’s how I understand how Love – ‘bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.’ 1 Corinthians 13:7
Yeshua's Relationship with the Scribes and the Pharisees
Granted, Yeshua pulled no punches when it come to the religious authorities of His day for their strict, legalistic, tyrannical rule over the people (Matthew Chapter 23). Holding them to a higher standard, He called them ‘hypocrites,’ ‘white-washed tombs’ and revealed in specific ways how they broke all Ten Commandments while teaching them and pretending to keep them right. Yeshua went out of His way to break their man-made doctrines, purposely ticking them off. Sure, we can do that too.
However, Yeshua used something many of us Hebrews lack today – DISCERNMENT. Yeshua discerned when the religious authorities got it right and when they got it wrong. He is the Master at separating the holy from the profane, lies from the truth, and right from wrong. Yeshua didn’t throw out everything Jewish, just because the rabbis were so corrupt in their ways and had a bad influence on the people. Our Master Teacher taught us how to tell the difference between the truth of the Torah and man-made doctrines.
Then Yeshua spoke to the crowds and His disciples, saying, The scribes and the Pharisees have sat down on Moses’ seat. Then all things, whatever they tell you to keep, keep and do. But do not do according to their works, for they say, and do not do.” Matthew 23:2-3, LITV
If everything the Jewish religious authorities taught was wrong and to be avoided like the plague, why would Yeshua say ‘to keep (observe), keep and do’ whatever they tell you?
Here’s the distinction. When the religious authorities were truly teaching on the seat of Moses, then, and only then, is a believer to ‘keep, keep and do’ what they say. As Yeshua did well to explain, their works contradicted the very Torah they taught. So the Master taught against doing according to the works of the hypocritical authorities.
But when we discern that they teach the Torah true to Moses then yes, we are to observe and do what Moses taught, regardless if it came via ‘scribes and Pharisees.’
Then said He (Yeshua) unto them, “Therefore every scribe which is instructed unto the Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a man that is a householder, which brings forth out of his treasure things new and old.” Matthew 13:52
Maybe the teachers of the Torah in Judaism do have some old treasures to offer! Maybe we shouldn’t throw out some of those precious treasures with them! Sounds like something all believers in Yeshua could benefit from and take advantage of for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Blessings to you in the Name of our Jewish Messiah Ben David,
David Klug