Looking for 144,000 Jews: If Found, Please Contact Jesus

Published on February 27, 2005 By TaBoo Tenente In Religion

In 1894, a Hungarian "Rabbi", Leopold Cohn, firmly established the roots of Jews for Jesus in an unaffiliated but intimately related movement in America. He founded the American Board of Missions to the Jews, a title later streamlined into the more attractive-sounding "Chosen People's Ministries". Sounds like the "A" League baseball team at a parochial school, does it not? His method was simple: he set up shop in Brooklyn around the turn of the century, and provided "English and citizen classes, sewing lessons, medical assistance and New Testaments in Yiddish." (Jessica Ravitz, Moment, Dec. 2004)

"Jews for Jesus" is a fascinating advertisement campaign. In order to explore, we need to build two labels: "Secular Christianity" and "Community Christianity". The first denotes a default orientation: a Christmas-celebrating, Jingle-Bells-singing setting. The second describes a certain directory of one of many Christian sects, containing individuals of faith who share the faith with their Christian brethren.

None of this explains the coalition on the street corner with the baseball caps and the tee-shirts, handing out subway-litter to every passer-by with a sense of embarrassed politeness. These aren't the sleekly-dressed bicyclers or streetwalkers fulfilling a coming-of-age mission, interested in spreading the Mormon words to everyone, Hear Ye, Jews, and Hear Ye, Christian Seculars and Ye Christian Communities; Hear Ye, one and all. Jews for Jesus wages a campaign for Jews--and Jews only--to join the new Tribe--a select, modern equivalent to head the "welcome home" committee for Jesus.

So who are these Jews for Jesus? We defined two grossly general groups with Christianity, for the purpose of explaining that Jews for Jesus explains a distinct spiritual and metaphysical cosmology. Some evangelicals believe that 144,000 Jews need to convert, must find the Christ before Jesus will return--and this 144,000 figure doesn't bode well for the remaining Jews, who should expect an uncomfortable living condition for all of eternity. Jews for Jesus denotes an apparent paradox, an oxymoron, especially as viewed by Jews . . . sort of similar to a vegetarian ordering a bratwurst with bacon bits at a Milwaukee Brewers game in August.

Jews for Jesus, as a term, depends on two ideas. The first defines Judaism as a race, a people descended from the tribes of Judah and Israel; Jewish tradition agrees with this definition. More: Jewish law requires a Jew to have a Jewish mother. If your mother is Jewish, so are you. The second idea suggested by the unlikely name "Jews for Jesus" demands that no-one is born a Christian. Faith in Jesus is not genetic, not instinctual nor automatic. Faith and faith alone defines a Christian.

Therefore, of course, a community of individuals with the proper credentials might accurately be labeled "Jews for Jesus"--or, to put it another way, a Jew who believes in Jesus would still be a Jew. While this concept is the most offensive and ridiculous for Jews of traditional belief, it is the most essential for Jews for Jesus members. All belief centers around the fact. Not all Jews for Jesus congregants are Jews, though. They collect a mighty army that numbers people of many races and creeds in order to help the Jews evolve.

My dilemma is this: I believe the effort is a waste of debatably valuable energy. To attempt to sway someone from a path that leads to spirituality for the sake of another path that may also lead to spirituality, is to create karmic waves of the worst sort. To believe that one's path is the uniquely correct path to spirituality is the most base, closed-minded tripe on the market. Jews for Jesus as a spiritual marketing device strikes me as a morally bankrupt conception that, if such things exist, will receive just dessert upon the arrival of whatever messianic era or spiritual awakening that may wait for humanity.

Strangely enough, I do see another side. Let me suggest two motivations for the misguided individual on the street corner. Her salvation is in the balance. His faith must be proved. The conditions required to deliver her unto the promised land have not yet been met. As such, I denounce these infidels as selfish, blinded fools who yet sink their souls deeper into the muck.

But what of the individual who has seen? Such individuals exist. They know. A woman feels the touch of god upon her heart when all seems lost. A narrow-minded man, in a sudden, unsought and unexpected epiphany understands a story for the first time. An unprepared woman with an average and easily predicted life finds herself confronted by the spacious infinite and discovers herself to be small, unloved, and irrevocably alone . . . until she remembers a phrase from her disinterested years as a Sunday school student. These people have seen and in fact they have seen the truth, albeit only one, narrow path of truth. These men and women standing nervously upon the street corner are speaking aloud only to fulfill an ethereal, courageous obligation they feel to their messiah. It behooves me to accept that they are not doing it for themselves, nor really are they doing it for me. They are doing it in the name of the truth they have found.

While I may understand (or believe I understand) that the roads to truth are many, and the truth of life is that the path under your feet is the only path you may take, I will take a bow to you, if you are one such individual, though you misunderstand me unto time eternal. Millions of individuals in the world (me included) piss our lives away, and have no firm ground from which we might justly criticize what you have discovered. I feel you moving in my heart.

But you of the first group of preachers, take special note. You cannot accumulate enough spiritual street credit to achieve what your more honest, more sincere sidewalk curb-mates have discovered. You can't earn a large enough commission on your sales to save yourself from the wasted life you've created for yourself. Take a breath and count to three. Look deeply and honestly into your heart. Your God is looking for you.

Copyright ©2004, ©2005, ©2006 Joshua Suchman. All rights reserved.
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Comments

Larry Kuperman

on Feb 27, 2005

Good post, thoughtful and thought-provoking:

TaBoo is referring to the Rapture. Just in case anyone missed the reference, here is Revelation Chapter 7:

4 I heard the number of those who had been marked with the seal, one hundred and forty-four thousand marked 4 from every tribe of the Israelites:
5 twelve thousand were marked from the tribe of Judah, 5 twelve thousand from the tribe of Reuben, twelve thousand from the tribe of Gad,
6 twelve thousand from the tribe of Asher, twelve thousand from the tribe of Naphtali, twelve thousand from the tribe of Manasseh,
7 twelve thousand from the tribe of Simeon, twelve thousand from the tribe of Levi, twelve thousand from the tribe of Issachar,
8 twelve thousand from the tribe of Zebulun, twelve thousand from the tribe of Joseph, and twelve thousand were marked from the tribe of Benjamin.
13 Then one of the elders spoke up and said to me, "Who are these wearing white robes, and where did they come from?"
14 I said to him, "My lord, you are the one who knows." He said to me, "These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
15 "For this reason they stand before God's throne and worship him day and night in his temple. The one who sits on the throne will shelter them.
16 They will not hunger or thirst anymore, nor will the sun or any heat strike them.

For thousands of years Jews have resisted conversion. Attempts to convert the Jews as a people include the Babylonians and Assyrians (the first Diaspora), the Romans (the second Diaspora), the Christians (repeated, but including the Inquisition) and the Muslims.

Muhammed tried to convert the Jews of Medina and, when they refused to recognize him as a prophet, expelled them, murdered them and enslaved them. See http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Muhammad.html

Martin Luther tried to convert the Jews and, when he failed, wrote "On the Jews and their Lies," a virulent anti-semitic text. See http://www.humanitas-international.org/showcase/chronography/documents/luther-jews.htm

Please note that Revelations DOESN'T say that Jews need to convert, merely to have "survived the time of great distress; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." Certainly, the Jews have survived many times of great distress, the Holocaust of World War II among them.

Revelation 12:11 defines the Blood of the Lamb as "and they loved not their lives unto the death." Which may be taken to mean having courage of one's convictions even when facing possible loss of life. Again, a condition met and more than met as demonstrated by history. So, wholesale conversion of the Jews to Christianity seems to be a condition set by men, not by the New Testament.

Let me pose a question. The God who celebrates the sacrifices of early Christian martyrs, does He only applaud moral fortitude of Christians or of all His peoples? Would he not think highly of those Jews in Spain who endured the Auto De Fe rather than convert? Would He not be impressed by the bravery of Islamic martyrs or Hindu martyrs just as much as that of Christian martyrs?

If a Jew feels drawn to the teachings of Jesus or Muhammed or Krishna, he should make that journey, as Leopold Cohn did. Similarly, if a Christian feels drawn to Judaism, he should make that journey.

Biography of Leopold Cohn, founder of The Chosen Ministries: http://www.shalom.org.uk/Rabbis/cohn.htm

TaBoo Tenente

on Feb 28, 2005

thank you, larry. excellent response.

there is something so conceptually beautiful about faith. all religions ask for acts of faith, whether these take the form of traditional rituals or dress or pilgrimmages. christianity takes the concept of faith and elevates it, makes it even more than a buddhist faith in nothing, makes faith transcend the corrupt human condition.

it is a step, a leap . . . however you visualize the concept, the symbol represents the single, pure step allowed to human kind.

but the concept and symbol has been tainted with the belief that converting the world to christianity is embedded in the idea of faith. faith is really only an acceptance of the path under your feet. for christians, this should imply that your saviour has set your feet with love, and in order to transcend your condition, you must accept that love. these are the things your messiah preached.

the loudest, most vocal representatives of religions tend to have the most narrow comprehension of the spirit . . . having more interest in the institution and one's place within its canon. there is a hasidic story told about the baal shem tov, master of the good name and practicioner of the incarnation of love and spirituality of judaism. the story goes that he entered a synagogue to pray with the congregation. the people prayed with all the fever and force their lungs could provide, but the baal shem tov turned and left the temple. the rabbi of the congregation chased after him, imploring him to return.

"why do you leave, when so much prayer is contained within one building?" the rabbi asked.

"i leave because so much prayer is contained within one building," the baal shem tov replied. "theres no room left for me."

an act of prayer or a commitment of faith is between you and your god. "everything is in the hands of god except the fear of god". you take one righteous step and god takes care of the rest. everything else is vanity, ignorance, and the corrupted condition of humanity.

tbt

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