Comments for Chutzpah, News, and Views

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by Derek Leman

Derek Leman — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 02:09:31 +0000

Gene:

You and I see eye to eye (ha, didn’t mean to rhyme). But I think my bigger objection was not to dissing Tolkien, but to the fundamentalist attack on cultural references.

Derek

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by Gene Shlomovich

Gene Shlomovich — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 01:13:07 +0000

“Lots more Jews have read Tolkien than the good Chofetz Chaim. Lots more Jews understand a cultural reference to Sauron than know the meaning of lashon hara. ”

Which, of course, doesn’t reflect all too well on those “lots more Jews” at all. Derek, I know that you are a big fan of Tolkien, so you understandably seem to have taken personally benkeshet’s remarks. You shouldn’t have. I believe his or her point was that a J4J rep, with their general veneer or Jewishness, is very unlikely to have resorted to a bit of “man-made” (as they would call it) Jewish wisdom to make a point about say ethics, but would much more readily use secular or Christian works to do so. Which is very true.

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by Derek Leman

Derek Leman — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 20:27:21 +0000

benkeshet:

You wrongly assume that all Jews avoid secular and Christian reading. Perhaps you are from the insular world of a certain kind of Orthodoxy. Lots more Jews have read Tolkien than the good Chofetz Chaim. Lots more Jews understand a cultural reference to Sauron than know the meaning of lashon hara. But, if you are a student of the Chofetz Chaim, does your critique measure up to his standards?

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by benkeshet

benkeshet — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 19:32:00 +0000

b”h

Regrettably, the choice of Tolkien’s “Sauron” as an example to express mussar instead of, say, “The Chofetz Chaim,” proves from the very source the main point of the article.

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by Believer

Believer — Thu, 26 May 2011 20:33:00 +0000

Thank you for saying this!
I work in a business run by Orthodox Jews. They don’t understand “Messianics” and what you say about trying to offer them a Torah-less “Jesus” is so true. So many are clueless about what we believe. We are in agreement more than dis-agreement (with the exception of course of Yeshua as Messiah). I have put myself in their place, and agree: if I were a Jew, and presented the “Torah-less Jesus” I too would reject “Him”. They generally tend to lump all “Christians” into one folder: evangelicals, Catholics, etc- it’s all the same to them. I’m not speaking for all of non Messianic Jews- Just the ones I work with. Can’t blame them. These people KNOW Torah, they are not ignorant. To expect them to toss out Torah and their Jewish way of life, is ludicrous. I believe, if presented with the Torah-keeping Jewish YESHUA, they’d be more open to receiving Him as their personal Messiah. Just my thoughts….

Comment on A Double Standard for Israel by A double standard for Israel « Divine Reversal

A double standard for Israel « Divine Reversal — Tue, 24 May 2011 03:32:00 +0000

[...] This article first appeared in the Chutzpah, News, and Views blog of Messianic Judaism Media http://www.messianicjudaism.me. [...]

Comment on A Double Standard for Israel by louise

louise — Mon, 23 May 2011 23:09:12 +0000

This commentary says it all. It made me think, and it made me cry, for the beauty of the truth in all that was said. Thank you for posting it.

Comment on A Double Standard for Israel by Russ Resnik on Israel and the Double Standard | Messianic Jewish Musings

Russ Resnik on Israel and the Double Standard | Messianic Jewish Musings — Mon, 23 May 2011 17:11:38 +0000

[...] http://www.messianicjudaism.me/media/2011/05/23/a-double-standard-for-israel/ This entry was posted in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. ← Israel and Impossible Things [...]

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by Walter

Walter — Mon, 09 May 2011 17:46:56 +0000

Hi Ruth,

No need to apologize for intruding; I thought that’s what this kind of thing was for.
I would not have insinuated you consciously assumed those things. Rather in almost any statement we make there are implied assumptions. On that basis, I thought that my inferences were valid, to a greater or lesser degree.
JFJ is a major, public organization with very public positions and I think the issues I touch on have arisen in various public arenas previously, so I didn’t think it was out of bounds to say what I said. Even with that though I thought, and prayed, long and hard about making the article public.

The content of my article hopefully makes it clear why I felt it important enough to want it to get to a wider audience. Hope that is helpful.

As an aside, I loved and respected your Dad (I think he liked me too.) and invited him, along with other JFJ representatives, to speak multiple times when I led a congregation in Cleveland years ago. Turns out that he and my wife Linda were probably 5th or 6th cousins and he used to hang out by Linda’s bubbe’s store when he was young.

Comment on Jews for Jesus and the Gospel Blimp by Ruth Rosen

Ruth Rosen — Fri, 06 May 2011 17:24:35 +0000

No, I didn’t assume anything on your list of assumptions.
I can see why you disagree with what you think I said as per your list. But your list of assumptions does what is natural to do — takes some grain of something real that I said and filters it through the existing beliefs and expectations. I think the closest thing on your list that I can own is “not aware enough to avoid his trap in this instance” but that still doesn’t express what I meant or how I see it. I still think it’s an interesting exercise and haven’t told or suggested anything to you that I don’t keep on my list of things to remind myself. But since we don’t know eachother it was probably not appropriate. I’m sorry to have intruded.