Reform Rabbi Dan Cohn-Sherbok On Messianic Judaism

Dan Cohn-Sherbok is a rabbi of Reform Judaism and a prolific author on religion. He is currently Professor of Jewish Theology at the University of Wales, Lampeter. Contrary to the official position of Reform Judaism, Cohn-Sherbok is sympathetic to Messianic Judaism and Secular Humanistic Judaism. Cohn-Sherbok calls for the reintegration of Messianic Jews into the Jewish community as the seventh light on the Menorah (lamp-stand) of Judaism, taking their place along with the Hasidic, Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist and Humanistic branches of Judaism. Gradually some Jewish scholars are giving serious academic attention to Messianic Judaism. Perhaps this is because the Messianic Jewish movement is growing and gaining recognition-once again-as a significant religious community that cannot be ignored, despite opposition from the Jewish religious establishment. In Messianic Judaism, Cohn-Sherbok seeks to provide “an objective account of this important development in modern Jewish life,” first by tracing the development of Messianic Judaism from its origins in ancient times, then by assessing the movement’s claim to represent an authentic interpretation of the Jewish faith, and finally by describing three alternative models of viewing the relationship between Messianic Judaism and the Jewish community (p. xii).

The first model is “Orthodox exclusivism.” Orthodox Judaism rejects not only Messianic Judaism, but all non-Orthodox Jewish movements in the world, since it believes there is only one legitimate form of the faith: Orthodox Judaism.

The second model is “Non-Orthodox exclusivism.” Despite their own rejection by the Orthodox, all other branches of modern Judaism “are united in their rejection of Messianic Judaism as an authentic expression of the Jewish faith” (p. 208).

Third is the “pluralist model.” Here the author offers “a more tolerant view of the Messianic movement,” but does not mention the names of any proponents of this model. Since modern Jewry is no longer united by belief and practice, “pluralists maintain that the exclusion of Messianic Judaism from the circle of legitimate expressions of the Jewish heritage is totally inconsistent” (p. 210). In many respects, he says, “Messianic Jews are more theistically oriented and more Torah-observant even than their counterparts within the Conservative and Reform movements” (p. 212). In this model, using the image of the seven-branched menorah he says, “Messianic Judaism should be seen merely as one among many expressions of the Jewish faith, [alongside] Hasidism, Orthodox Judaism, Conservative Judaism, Reform Judaism, Reconstructionist Judaism, and Humanistic Judaism” (p. 212). Cohn-Sherbok concludes that the pluralist model, in which Messianic Judaism is included, “is the only reasonable starting point for inter-community relations [among Jews] in the twenty-first century” (p. 213).

Yeshua said the following concerning those who are Jewish and believe in Him:
Matit’yah 23:34 Therefore I am sending you prophets and sages and Torah-teachers — some of them you will kill, indeed, you will have them executed on stakes as criminals; some you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. 35 And so, on you will fall the guilt for all the innocent blood that has ever been shed on earth, from the blood of innocent Hevel to the blood of Z’kharyah Ben-Berekhyah, whom you murdered between the Temple and the altar. 36 Yes! I tell you that all this will fall on this generation! 37 “Yerushalayim! Yerushalayim! You kill the prophets! You stone those who are sent to you!

Yochanan 15:17 This is what I command you: keep loving each other! 18 “If the world hates you, understand that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, the world would have loved its own. But because you do not belong to the world — on the contrary, I have picked you out of the world — therefore the world hates you. 20 Remember what I told you, `A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you too; if they kept my word, they will keep yours too. 21 But they will do all this to you on my account, because they don’t know the One who sent me.

Special thanks to “Moshe-משיחי חסידים של הדרך” of Yahoo! Answers for compiling this information.

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Early Trinitarian Quotes – CARM

There are cult groups (Jehovah’s Witnesses, The Way International, Christadelphians, etc.) who deny the Trinity and state that the doctrine was not mentioned until the 4th Century until after the time of the Council of Nicea (325). This council “was called by Emperor Constantine to deal with the error of Arianism [see page 45] which was threatening the unity of the Christian Church.”
     The following quotes show that the doctrine of the Trinity was indeed alive-and-well before the Council of Nicea.

Polycarp (70-155/160). Bishop of Smyrna. Disciple of John the Apostle.
     ”O Lord God almighty…I bless you and glorify you through the eternal and heavenly high priest Jesus Christ, your beloved Son, through whom be glory to you, with Him and the Holy Spirit, both now and forever” (n. 14, ed. Funk; PG 5.1040).

Justin Martyr (100?-165?). He was a Christian apologist and martyr.
      “For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Savior Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water” (First Apol., LXI).

Ignatius of Antioch (died 98/117). Bishop of Antioch. He wrote much in defense of Christianity.
      “In Christ Jesus our Lord, by whom and with whom be glory and power to the Father with the Holy Spirit for ever” (n. 7; PG 5.988).
      “We have also as a Physician the Lord our God Jesus the Christ the only-begotten Son and Word, before time began, but who afterwards became also man, of Mary the virgin. For ‘the Word was made flesh.’ Being incorporeal, He was in the body; being impassible, He was in a passable body; being immortal, He was in a mortal body; being life, He became subject to corruption, that He might free our souls from death and corruption, and heal them, and might restore them to health, when they were diseased with ungodliness and wicked lusts.” (Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, eds., The ante-Nicene Fathers, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975 rpt., Vol. 1, p. 52, Ephesians 7.)

Irenaeus (115-190). As a boy he listened to Polycarp, the disciple of John. He became Bishop of Lyons.
      “The Church, though dispersed throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith: …one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and His manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father ‘to gather all things in one,’ and to raise up anew all flesh of the whole human race, in order that to Christ Jesus, our Lord, and God, and Savior, and King, according to the will of the invisible Father, ‘every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess; to him, and that He should execute just judgment towards all…’” (Against Heresies X.l)

Tertullian (160-215). African apologist and theologian. He wrote much in defense of Christianity.
      “We define that there are two, the Father and the Son, and three with the Holy Spirit, and this number is made by the pattern of salvation…[which] brings about unity in trinity, interrelating the three, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They are three, not in dignity, but in degree, not in substance but in form, not in power but in kind. They are of one substance and power, because there is one God from whom these degrees, forms and kinds devolve in the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.” (Adv. Prax. 23; PL 2.156-7).

Origen (185-254). Alexandrian theologian. Defended Christianity and wrote much about Christianity.
      “If anyone would say that the Word of God or the Wisdom of God had a beginning, let him beware lest he direct his impiety rather against the unbegotten Father, since he denies that he was always Father, and that he has always begotten the Word, and that he always had wisdom in all previous times or ages or whatever can be imagined in priority…There can be no more ancient title of almighty God than that of Father, and it is through the Son that he is Father” (De Princ. 1.2.; PG 11.132).
      “For if [the Holy Spirit were not eternally as He is, and had received knowledge at some time and then became the Holy Spirit] this were the case, the Holy Spirit would never be reckoned in the unity of the Trinity, i.e., along with the unchangeable Father and His Son, unless He had always been the Holy Spirit.” (Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, eds., The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975 rpt., Vol. 4, p. 253, de Principiis, 1.111.4)
      “Moreover, nothing in the Trinity can be called greater or less, since the fountain of divinity alone contains all things by His word and reason, and by the Spirit of His mouth sanctifies all things which are worthy of sanctification…” (Roberts and Donaldson, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 4, p. 255, de Principii., I. iii. 7).

      If, as the anti-Trinitarians maintain, the Trinity is not a biblical doctrine and was never taught until the council of Nicea in 325, then why do these quotes exist? The answer is simple: the Trinity is a biblical doctrine and it was taught before the council of Nicea in 325 A.D.
      Part of the reason that the Trinity doctrine was not “officially” taught until the time of the Council of Nicea is because Christianity was illegal until shortly before the council. It wasn’t really possible for official Christian groups to meet and discuss doctrine. For the most part, they were fearful of making public pronouncements concerning their faith.
      Additionally, if a group had attacked the person of Adam, the early church would have responded with an official doctrine of who Adam was. As it was, the person of Christ was attacked. When the Church defended the deity of Christ, the doctrine of the Trinity was further defined.
      The early church believed in the Trinity, as is evidenced by the quotes above, and it wasn’t necessary to really make them official. It wasn’t until errors started to creep in, that councils began to meet to discuss the Trinity as well as other doctrines that came under fire.

CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS AND RESEARCH MINISTRY
Copyright Matthew J. Slick, 1996 – 2006

 

 

Let US make man in our image

There are several verses in the Old Testament where God speaks as a plurality.  Many trinitarians quote these verses to help support the Trinity doctrine because they strongly suggest that there is more than one person in the godhead.

• “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth,” (Gen. 1:26, NASB).
• “Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, lest he stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever,” (Gen. 3:22, NASB).
• “Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech,” (Gen. 11:7, NASB).
• “Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I. Send me!” (Isaiah 6:8, NASB)

     Those opposed to the doctrine of the Trinity say that God is speaking of Himself in any “royal” sense, in a “plural of majesty.”  They can say this, but biblically there is never any account of a king or a ruler speaking of himself in a plural sense or in the third person.  So, there is no biblical support for God using it of Himself in this way.
     In regards to Gen. 1:26, those who deny the Trinity say that God when God says, “Let Us make…” He is speaking with the angels in mind.  The problem with this is that angels do not create.  There is absolutely no biblical evidence that angels created anything at all.  We see in Isaiah 44:24, “Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, and the one who formed you from the womb, “I, the Lord, am the maker of all things, Stretching out the heavens by Myself, And spreading out the earth all alone.”  God made all things alone.  Therefore, the “us” in “Let Us make man in our image” cannot be the angels.  Furthermore, people are not created in the image of angels, but of God.
     The three verses in Genesis do not prove that the Trinity is true.  However, they cannot be dismissed by the assumption that God is speaking of himself in a type of third person way. 
      Furthermore, notice in the force verse above, Isaiah 6:8, that’s God is speaking in the singular and then switches to the plural.  He says, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?”  This is on the unusual construction.  The singular speaker refers to himself in the plural.

CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS AND RESEARCH MINISTRY

© Matthew J. Slick, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003