Answering Jewish Objections
The Answering Jewish Objections section stemmed from readers seeking answers to Jewish objections to Yeshua as the Messiah. If you share this information with Jewish friends who don't believe in Yeshua, keep three things in mind:
1) The mental exercise of answering a person's objections will not cause that person's heart to change.
"If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead." (Luke 16:31). The main reason Jews (generally speaking) don't accept Yeshua as the Messiah is that G-d has blinded their eyes (Romans 11:7-8) and hardened their hearts for a season to allow the fullness of the gentiles to come into G-d's kingdom. (Romans 11:25) Salvation is part of G-d's sovereign plan, and until G-d's timing is complete, that national blindness and hardness will not change.
2) Salvation is G-d's work, not ours.
Our job as believers is to (a) testify as witnesses to the work G-d has performed in each of our lives (Acts 1:8) and (b) to make disciples (Matthew 28:19-20) of those G-d has saved by His choice (John 15:16) and power (Acts 2:47). Please don't think you have any responsibility for "getting people saved," including Jews. G-d saved them once during the Exodus from Egypt (Exodus 14:30), and He is entirely able to save them again when the time is right.
3) Jewish believers in Messiah do NOT cease to be Jewish.
I firmly believe that Jewish believers in Messiah remain Jewish. I also affirm (as did Messiah Yeshua) that He did not come to "abolish the Law or the Prophets" and that G-d's Law, the Torah of Moses, is still in effect. G-d declares that, as part of the New Covenant, He will write the Torah upon the hearts of those who believe. (Jeremiah 31:31-33)
I encourage Jews everywhere to walk in G-d's commandments—not to obtain salvation—but because it is G-d's purpose for their lives:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10)
When the LORD your G-d shall cut off the nations from before you, when you go in to dispossess them, and you have dispossessed them, and dwell in their land; take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them, after that they are destroyed from before you; and that you inquire not after their gods, saying: 'How used these nations to serve their gods? even so will I do likewise.' You shall not do so to the LORD your G-d; for every abomination to the LORD, which He hates, have they done to their gods; for even their sons and their daughters do they burn in the fire to their gods. (Deuteronomy 12:29-31 JPS)
G-d forbids human sacrifice!
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- One Messianic Gentile
Jesus was never properly anointed! Instead, he was smeared with ointment (Matthew 26:7-9, Mark 14:3-5, Luke 7:37). To be the Christ/Messiah/Anointed One, he had to be appropriately anointed. To be correctly anointed is the following - Exodus 30:22-25, Exodus 29:7, 1 Samuel 10:1, 1 Samuel 16:13, 1 Kings 1:34, 39, 45.
Jesus was never anointed in this way, and so he cannot be A messiah, much less THE messiah.
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- One Messianic Gentile
So Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink." (John 6:53-55)
Jesus' own words condemn him as a false prophet who taught others to violate the Torah by promoting cannibalism.
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- One Messianic Gentile
Fathers shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for their fathers; everyone shall be put to death for his own sin. (Deuteronomy 24:16)
The concept of one man dying in another person's place is not consistent with the Bible and the teachings of Judaism.
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- One Messianic Gentile
The Bible says that the Messiah will fulfill many prophecies.
Jesus has not done so. Christians counter that Jesus will fulfill these in the Second Coming, but Jewish sources show that the Messiah will fulfill the prophecies outright; no concept of a second coming exists in the Bible.
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- One Messianic Gentile
- Virgin birth- Isaiah 7:14 says that a "young woman" will give birth, not a "virgin".
- Suffering servant- The suffering servant in Isaiah 53 refers to Israel, not Jesus.
Verses that Christians claim refer to Jesus are often mistranslated.
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- One Messianic Gentile
Judaism, unique among the world's major religions, does not rely on "claims of miracles" as the basis for its religion. Jewish belief is based solely on national revelation.
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- One Messianic Gentile
G-d established requirements in His Law that defined a kosher sacrifice, so why would He break His Word by requiring His own son's bloody and horrific sacrifice? He would not. Such action would be contrary to His nature, His character, and His own Word.
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- One Messianic Gentile
Jesus did not embody the personal qualifications of Messiah, including:
- being a prophet
- being a descendant of David
- obeying the Torah
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- One Messianic Gentile
The Talmud says Jesus was an idolater, so he cannot be the Messiah.
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- One Messianic Gentile
Many of the objections I have received are echoed (sourced?) in the Aish.com article "Why Jews Don't Believe in Jesus".
I have one additional observation about the notes from that article.
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- One Messianic Gentile
