Deconstructing Messianic Myths: Exploring Disparities (Past Leaders Discuss Mashiach & True Judaism): Episode 22

Episode Transcript
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(00:09):
All right, let me go ahead and click this button.
Make sure it works this time. Yeah, I wanted some tea with
honey to help my throat, 'cause I just got over a cold, so.
I'm going through one right now.Yeah, I'm on antibiotics.
It's the cold weather and the rains and everything so.
Yeah, my wife has to get on antibiotics now.
She has a sinus infection. Yeah, yeah.

(00:29):
Yeah. All right.
Here we go. Looks like we're active.
All right, Welcome to the Pulling the Threads podcast.
And today I'm going to be doing a interview with author David
LeBlanc, former pastor, Calvary Chapel pastor and messianic
leader, And Richard Cortez, who is a, you know, former messianic

(00:49):
pastor who converted to Conservative Judaism and is now
in the process of converting to Orthodox Judaism.
We're making that transition andas such, you know a little bit
by myself, about myself. I was also a former pastor
leader in the messianic movement.

(01:10):
You had a messianic sedur and you know, was a teacher and
stuff like that. So we all have kind of a shared
experience with that as a background and as a preamble to
that, I'm going to do a preface to the first question.
We're going to kind of go, I'm going to do my preamble, then

(01:32):
ask my question. And I want you guys to take
turns answering. We started to cover a little bit
of this in the last interview I did with David LeBlanc.
But I do want to get a little deeper and go into a little more
detail about this stuff. So we are going to be dealing
with Messianic Judaism, what they get wrong, Hebrew roots.
And in general, this is also going to speak to like how

(01:55):
Christians misunderstand a lot of things as well.
But and then I do want us to kind of talk shop about the
different Messianic movements, the Hebrew roots, and we'll kind
of guide us through it. So my first question here is how
did Messianic Jews get the Jewish Jesus wrong?
There's a little preamble to it.So Jesus was culturally Jewish

(02:16):
according to, you know, the historical Jesus scholarship,
what we get from the New Testament.
He participated in Judaism. A lot of them like to claim that
he criticized it. There are debates whether he was
a Pharisee or a Zealot or an Essene or something along those
lines. Did he mean to start a new
religion? Would the historical Jesus

(02:38):
support Messianic Judaism? As it is today, Christianity is
a product of Catholicism and notJewish.
Messianics adhere to Christian belief and failed to understand
what it means if there was a historical Jesus who was Jewish.
As I've researched in the past, the original Jesus movement was
totally Jewish, did not intend to create a new religion, and I

(03:00):
don't believe they'd support theidea of modern Messianic
Judaism. The term itself is disingenuous
in the 1st century when Messianics use it to validate
their modern experience. Whereas there might have been
Jews who are completely Jewish and believed in a Messianic
figure, they would not have believed in a dying and rising

(03:20):
savior God or the soteriology that comes through Pauline
Christianity. And this would have been
antithetical to the Jesus movement, or at least Judaism in
the 1st century. And as I've uncovered in my blog
post discussed here, Evianites and Nazarenes and other, you

(03:43):
know, we call Jewish Christians in the 1st century.
Like Christian isn't the best word, but followers of a
historical Jesus, they most likely observe the festival
Shabbat kept kosher. There's indications they
converted Gentiles through conversion mikvah in a communal
way. This no way invalid validates

(04:05):
Messianic Judaism. Yet they try to use the
historical claims to validate their branch of Christianity.
And what did they get wrong? And the final part right here is
let's I want to avoid a discussion on what Pauline
Christianity and the birth of Catholicism, but let's focus on
the 1st century, what it meant to Judaism, not Christianity as

(04:25):
late, later understood and how to Messianics get it wrong.
And now Messianics are saying Christians will have, you know,
problems with Christianity untilthey come to terms with their
Jewish Messiah and its Hebrew roots.
How is this all very convoluted and wrong?
And I'd like you guys to take turns kind of answering this.
And I know I put a bunch in there.

(04:46):
So kind of tackle tackle what you can.
If Richard answers one thing, David, if you can cover another.
Richard, if you want to go aheadand answer how did they get it
wrong when they talk about the Jewishness of Jesus in Messianic
Judaism in 1st century as if it validates what they do?
Right, right. Like you said that's it's a it's

(05:09):
a question that it's hacked and loaded with answers and really
trying to tackle this. It's you have to really decipher
it, you know, through pieces like chopping a tree.
Essentially. One of the things that we
encounter that we you know that we understand in Judaism is that
the concept of Mashiach in Tanakh both in Talmudic times

(05:32):
and in Tanakh in Second Temple period was not foreign to the
Jewish nation one. For instance the role of
Mashiach and what he is supposedto be, what he is supposed to
do. As we read through now beings
and we read through the pariah as well, we find that this man
is supposed to bring, you know, an eternal peace to the world
and he's supposed to judge the nations with righteousness.

(05:56):
Of course his role of course is to bring the knowledge of God to
the whole entire world. So it's interesting that you
know the view for for Mashiach. And by the way when we find the
term Mashiach and and the Tanakh, we find that many, many
kings were considered Mashiach for instance.
So it's very common Barkova was a Mashiach, you know he was

(06:19):
talking to Mashiach. Again, Jesus being a mashiach
and sank a temple period. It's not sacrilege, just my
point where where it gets reallyI believe confused and I'll
speak in turns everybody in the audience can understand.
Where it gets really, really confused is when we start adding
to the role of this, of this Machida.

(06:41):
And the role of Mashiah in the Jewish world is never to die for
the sins of people, number one, of course doing miracles.
I mean not to say that he won't do miracles, but I mean again,
this is not necessarily the focus point.
And when we think about Jesus today, what do we think the the,
the miracle war, you know, it's just one of those things if you

(07:02):
don't think or you don't think, you know, speaking the, the
righteousness of the nation, youthink the, the, the one who does
healing and the one who died formy sins.
Those are the two main, you know, themes that you can
connect Jesus with today. So what the Mesianic movement is
trying always try to do is to beable to bring that back.
So you mentioned the Eben Nights.

(07:23):
It's very interesting. Much of the Ebonites, they have
died. I mean, there's a few of them
out there that have online, you know, services and whatnot, but
you don't even hear much about them today.
And then it still begs the question, you know, I I'm glad
that the Ebonites are, you know,the few that are left.
I'm glad that they are around because it still begs the

(07:43):
question. I actually had a Ebonite 11K to
our place and I I'm still kind of confused about how they
believe that Jesus can take awayyour sins or be an atonement for
you when he you know they don't believe.
Obviously in the virgin birth, at least once that I met, they
don't believe, they don't subscribe to that doctrine.

(08:06):
How can how can then he be an atonement for all mankind, for
the world and for eternity if heis not obviously divine, He's
just another man like you and I.So you know, these are the
problems, theological problems, that rise up with the Ebonites.
I'm trying to connect, you know,and bringing that restoration
back to my shield, so I mean. That that's that's interesting

(08:28):
that you bring that up the historically the earliest
Ebionites did not believe Jesus was a savior.
That developed later and early Ebionites rejected Paul and
Pauline Christianity. So the the later developed
because there was a splinter group between the two where they
did, you know, the ones that fall, you know, the Nazarenes

(08:51):
and Pauline. Christianity did eventually
adapt that, but originally the earliest Evianites didn't
believe that Jesus was a savior.So I just want to say
contextually they would be reinventing the past and adding
their own flavor to it now. Right today.
But anyways, I didn't want to interrupt you too much, but you
can keep going with your point. I just wanted to.
Kind of make no no no it's a it's a good point you know and

(09:14):
again that's yeah and I'm I'm glad you brought that up you
know I'm I'm I'm speaking in terms of modern day Indianites
today. It is true that in the Second
Temple period they didn't subscribe to this kind of
theology. And the again, Jesus would have
been just another Mashiah again and and that's that who were,
you know, ultimately didn't fulfill anything.

(09:35):
Essentially what Tanak says, anymore than Bat Hoba fulfilled
anything that Tanak said you know needed to be fulfilled.
Any other Mashiach for that matter?
Well, he may have done a little better.
Barcoca actually started a revolt, so he was on the path.
He did a little. Better he got further.
Right, right. Rabbi Akiva got behind him.
Right, right, right, right. So I mean he got a little

(09:56):
further than Jesus, So I mean you got to give the man credit
even though, but. Yeah so you know Jesus in the
historic in the historical context in my opinion is that
it's just been another you know possibly another rabbi you know
who will be as follows proclaiming to be Mashiach and
he got too loud and he got killed by Rome which again it

(10:17):
would have been another day in Rome.
That's my point. This was this is very common
Jews being crucified doing second temple period for for the
zealousness and and and the religious zeal it's not
something that is unheard of. We we see this the writings of
Josephus we see this and and theTalmud you know many of
historical references for this. So I believe Jesus probably was

(10:40):
just another one. Why is he, you know, stand out
from all of them? He probably had a good
following. And here's the, here's the
here's the caveat with this too.And and here's where it's hard
to decipher. So you mentioned earlier that
well, you know, more than likelyhe was a Torah observant rabbi
who if he went to look them to make the other Judas and say
he'd probably be appalled, whichI, you know, more than likely I

(11:02):
agree with you in that the problem is deciphering now what
you actually read in the Christian Bible.
What I mean for instance in one hand he is saying the the, the
teachers and the Pharisees. You know, they see them to see
the Moses, whatever they tell you to do that and do right.
But then in the other hand, he'sliterally violating Torah

(11:23):
because he's literally cursing the leaders and calling them
sums of devils publicly, which again, the Torah condemns by the
way. And so does the Talmud, yeah.
Absolutely. You know, it's, you know, it's
like what we just actually went through this Parsha Mishpatin
and that's one of the that's oneof the mishpat.
I mean that's a positive commandment.
You actually a negative commandment.
You shall not do this. Yeah.

(11:44):
Honor the Honor the leaders of the community, yeah.
Absolutely. You know, so we, we find that,
you know, many people say, well,he didn't break the Torah.
I'm sorry, he did break the Torah.
Right, right then and there. So that he did.
And I can point out several places where he broke Torah.
But again, the question is how do we decipher who the Christian
Bible now, Like, how do you pickand choose which one is

(12:07):
legitimate and which one is not?Because you got an opinion of
people that say, well, he was Torah observant.
Well, there's support for that in the in the Christian Bible.
I agree. But there's also support for
them, the Christian Bible that he wasn't.
So the question, my question is then how do you decide, How do
you pick and choose which Jesus you want to You want to
subscribe to the the Torah beating, one of the one that is

(12:28):
not Torah beating. And that's really where it
becomes, I believe where it getsa little, it can get a little
Gray area. At this point, it's because
again, we don't have anything with any accounts.
You know, like a lot of the stuff that he did, you'll see if
it's getting right about it. We don't find it really in the
historical accounts, so not much.
What's fine about him in the Talmud, it's it's it's in debate
at this point whether it was himbecause again, now we're talking

(12:51):
about a name that was very common in the 2nd century.
That's another thing. So there is a Jesus that is
talked about in the Talmud, which by the way is not in very
good favor more. Than.
One, so you know, again, this iswhere the problem is today.
How do we subscribe? How do we, how do we decipher?
I mean we got, we got so many, so many passages in the person
Bible where we see that he literally violates Torah and

(13:13):
adheres to that and you know, and and then we got other
passages where it appears that he's not.
I mean, so there might have beenan orally historical Jesus that
didn't. And then Roman Catholicism came
in and maybe they added or related Redactors added the the
critique of the Pharisees. Who knows?
What's the original core message?

(13:35):
What was added later, you know, What do you have to say, David,
about what's your answer to my bloviated question there?
Bloviated, really enjoyed what Richard had to say.
I concur 100% with everything, he said.
I think riffing a bit on some ofhis ideas there.
I think it's a great starting point that he brought us on with

(13:58):
because just speaking for instance, in Jewish tradition,
as you alluded to Richard, there's no passages in the
Talmud which specifically identify the Jesus of Christian
tradition. What we have is we have it.
If you, if you follow the actualliteral stories that you can

(14:20):
find in the Talmud, it looks like a guy who existed 100 years
before the Jesus story. And we have, of course, the
Toldoth Jeshu, which gives a much different account of
Jesus's origins than what we find in Christian tradition as
well. In fact, I've always found it

(14:40):
interesting that you have that passage in the Gospels which
insinuates and incriminates the Jewish leaders for making up a a
story about his followers stealing the body.
The body they they blame the Jewish leaders of.
Of making up this mythology to hide the identity of of the
Mashiach, when in fact that actually incriminates the

(15:03):
Christian writers in retrospect,Because that's actually a lot
more plausible than what the Christian Bible says happened.
The Christian Bible would expectus to believe in these fantastic
miracles and ascensions to heaven and all these other
elements, which I would Add all share commonality with Pagan
myths. They don't really share any

(15:25):
commonality with Jewish tradition.
And another thing that was goingthrough my mind as Richard was
speaking, because both of you were talking.
Well, I guess, Jeremiah, you brought up the idea of the
development of Christianity. One of the things that always
ended up bothering me ultimatelywith the Messianic perspective
on Jesus is there always, whether it's the Hebrew roots

(15:48):
groups or whether it's the Messianic Jewish groups of
various strains. They're always trying to engage
people in this effort to get back to the original
Christianity, right as this, this impetus of Jesus was a Jew
and this is how he would have believed and this is how he
would have lived. And yet they don't apply the
same principles when it comes tothe religious traditions in

(16:11):
question. They're inconsistent in their
argument. So they expect us to go back to
an earlier time before the establishment of rabbinic
Judaism and the establishment of, you know, the the, the oral
tradition as found of the Talmud.
They expect us to ignore all that and get back to this
undocumented, unknown Jesus thatthey can really literally, which

(16:35):
is what everybody does. They form Jesus in the image
that they want because they don't have any documentation of
what he really was or who he really was.
All they have is what they have,which is their scriptures and
the oral traditions of the Christian Church.
And so that it becomes a 0 sum argument to try to identify a
historical Jewish Jesus. Which is why I've always been

(16:57):
irritated with the historicity movement, because they they
missed the point of the argument.
So for instance, to illustrate my point, any Jew that learns
Judaism knows the 13 principles of Rambam.
Its. Core to Judaism.
But when were the 13 principles written down?
Well, they weren't written down until centuries after the Talmud

(17:18):
was completed, and yet they are accepted as part of a of a
Orthodox belief system within Judaism.
It's not law per SE Rambam's 13 principles, but yet functionally
in tradition, it kind of is. And so when you have this
development over a period of time, that has to be recognized
because today Judaism is not what it was in 50 AD.

(17:43):
It's it's it's developed and it has it has a tradition which
must be acknowledged and so you can't by by conversely, you
can't then erase Christian tradition and how it's developed
and ignore those doctrines and those teachings in your
evaluation of Jesus. If we're going to evaluate Jesus

(18:04):
from a religious perspective as a point of belief, we have to
include what the normative Christian Church says about him,
and then we have to evaluate those claims on those merits.
We can't just dismiss all that and say, well, that's not
relevant to us because we're following the original Jesus.
Really. Well, where is this original
Jesus? Can you show him to me in

(18:25):
history, as Richard already said, Josephus never talks about
him at all. In fact not just Josephus.
Everybody focuses on Josephus. But there were many other Roman
and great Greek historians of that period and Jewish
historians who wrote extensivelyduring that time period.
None of them talk about Jesus, not one.

(18:46):
And we know, for instance, that the the the testimony in
Flavianum and and Josephus is sowidely recognized for so many
centuries as an obvious forgery that no credible scholars even
that believe in Christianity would even cite it as evidence,
because it isn't evidence. So there is no physical evidence
of Jesus of the Christian tradition by Converse.

(19:09):
We know the fathers of Judaism because they were carefully
documented. We have the records we have it
in the Talmud. We have it in in a lot of the
other writings that are are extant from that period.
We have we have it in a lot of the the letters that that end up
becoming part of the Talmud. So we have the, you know we have

(19:30):
the early Meshnaic period where you have, you have a character
for instance like Benzakai who who had extensive interaction
with with, with Vespasian, with with even with Josephus.
Yet there's no mention whatsoever of this Jesus
character unless you go into thepassages which again I already

(19:53):
mentioned that they they would indicate an Egyptian magician
that that you know that married or or was stoned to death about
100 BC, which you can't use thatas evidence either.
The same, you know, we're not going to get into Paul, but just
as a point of reference. You can't discuss Christianity
Today of any denomination without wrestling with the

(20:15):
teachings of the Apostle Paul. Apostle Paul claims to have an
insider's view of the Sanhedrin.I've heard messianic leaders
claim that Paul was in line to be the Nazi that he was being
trained, which is so incredulous.
If this gentleman came from Tarsus, there was no Jewish

(20:35):
settlement in Tarsus, but there was a Roman legion there.
There's no Jewish settlement there in that time period.
So who is this Paul character and how come we don't ever hear
about him until the late middle 2nd century?
He doesn't exist Even in early church historians Paul is
unknown until after the turn of the century.
So. So everything that Christianity

(20:57):
bases itself on is is is speculation and none of it can
be verified. I lastly would like to emphasize
re emphasize the point that Richard made that even if we
want to contend that there was aa Jesus and Mashiach type figure

(21:18):
in that time period, that doesn't really establish
anything. So even if even if the Christian
Church could prove that there was a Jesus who lived in the 1st
century, as the New Testament claims, we still cannot take
those claims at face value, evenin the Torah itself, apart from
the oral tradition. If you just simply look at

(21:39):
Deuteronomy 13, you realize thatthere are already injunctions
within the Torah to vet any potential prophet or leader that
arises in the midst. And if they fail to produce the
results that they claim they areto be summarily dismissed,
they're not to be taken seriously.
So I mean that. I think Richard gave us a

(22:00):
fantastic starting point how to evaluate this issue.
Thank. You, David, and I love you.
I love you. What you just said was amazing.
I mean, thank you for all that information.
Absolutely true. That's that's the problem that
we are facing today. And this is where it becomes I I
think in my opinion also I like to add real quickly this really

(22:21):
it it sets a platform for people, I believe to have a
voice when you don't have clarity.
And you mentioned that in Judaism we have this tradition,
which by the way, proves in itself to be true as a matter of
fact. And the Tanakh even establishes
that, you know, your descendantswould not.
Essentially, they will not stand.
You know, if they go into idolatry, they will lose their

(22:41):
identity and will not stand. If Jesus was so true and
Christianity so true, why is it that we don't even have
descendants today? Why there's no record of
anything? So what we have is what we have
today. It's just a lot of confusion.
So again, going back to the platform, it gives a platform
for all these leaders to rise uptoday and be able to advance

(23:01):
essentially the doctrine that they're trying to erect in these
days. Why?
Because there's no proof of it. This is, this is again, this is
beautiful for rebels by the way and you know the, as you
probably know if being an Asianic leader, we don't, we
don't lack, you know, we didn't lack it, but I wouldn't say we
do in the past we didn't lack any rebels, unfortunately.

(23:22):
And that's what they do. They just try to take over the
congregations and and and and this is what we're finding
today. That's why the whole movement is
so confusing. I don't know if you know this.
It's just and we, like you said,we're not even talking about
Paul here yet. You know, we haven't even added
Paul to the equation. It just it it's a mass confusion
where again, it gives room for anybody.

(23:43):
And you know, we find this in the Book of Judges.
How is the book of Judges? And the very last verse of the
book of Judges, Shafim says thatthere was no king in Israel the
days everybody did what was right in their own eyes.
And I really believe that this is what we're witnessing today
within the sphere of Messianic Judaism, and even even some of
the as well. That's an interesting point.
Yeah. Yeah.

(24:04):
So Jesus, if he existed, there'snot a lot of historical records.
Maybe he was a marginal Jew because apparently he wasn't
discussed in any verifiable clear way.
So and he also comes from an unfalsifiable time.
I can't even say that word rightnow.

(24:24):
And unfalsifiable time that there is no proof of, so you
can't disprove it. So you make up a claim.
It could be anything and there'sno way to disprove it.
You know, I mentioned this in a podcast they did last week that
at the destruction of the Templeand 70 they would have
destroyed, you know, buildings and records.
And at the Bar Cocoa Revolt, they would have destroyed

(24:44):
records. That is why we have a record of
what happens after. And that's where the Talmud and
Christianity come from. You know, the reason we don't
have things before 1:30 and before 70 is because they were
destroyed on purpose. Now transitioning, you know,
kind of to the final question, to my question was Messianic
Jews are saying that Christians will have they have Christianity

(25:07):
wrong as long as they reject their Jewish Messiah.
That's very convoluted, right? I mean, the the if there was a
Jewish Jesus, he doesn't validate Messianic Judaism or
the later reinvented Roman Catholicism.
Now, Judaism has never been about a rabbi.
Now I want to go back to the point you mentioned Rambam's 13

(25:30):
principles. Now these can be ascertained in
general from a plain understanding from Torah, and
This is why they're not really rejected in the same sense where
Paul's teachings are completely rejected by Judaism because
they're not ascertained through a plain understanding of Torah.
And so before we move to the next points, I kind of want to
talk about this. What can be ascertained through

(25:52):
a plain understanding of Torah should be the foundation of what
a Messiah is, or what a faith that is rooted in the Torah in
Judaism is. And David, why don't you respond
first to this one? Yeah, sure.
My, my, my initial thoughts on that have always been the same,
you know? And this I'll just give the

(26:13):
perspective I I gained as I leftChristianity and left Messianic
faith. There's certain literary aspects
to the New Testament that are highly suspicious at the very
least. For instance, you mentioned, you
know what can we ascertain from Torah about Mashiach?
Well, there's very little from the actual Torah.
You know we have the obvious verse when you know when Jacob

(26:35):
is blessing his sons and you have the whole you know the the
Christians love to quote the theverse about the the rod of you
know ruling will never leave Judah and all that.
But but those you know as we don't we're not into that point
right now. I don't know if you're going to
go there where you know we have all these scriptures that get
misapplied and misconstrued by by Christian belief.

(26:58):
But essentially what I always found fascinating is like for
instance you take the Gospel of Matthew and it's very clear if
you look at it with open eyes that they are trying to portray
this Jesus character as another Moses.
So. So the life of Moses is
literally paralleled in almost every respect in the Gospel of

(27:19):
Matthew, from the birth narrative to, you know, the
whole thing, you know, running off to Egypt, you know, and then
the whole, even the ascension ofJesus is is cryptically similar
to the ascension of Moshe who never truly is seen to die.
He just disappears one day and and is a tradition that he was
taken up or whatever. But so that's a very, very clear

(27:43):
attempt to basically appropriatethe Jewish story for this new
story that they're writing. And it's very convenient.
It's almost like if I wanted to declare myself an expert
marksman and I went out and shotan arrow into a tree.
And then after I shot the arrow into the tree, I painted target
around the arrow to where it wasa bull's eye.

(28:04):
I look like a genius shot. And I've always had to laugh
when people say, well, Jesus fulfills all these prophecies.
Well, if you, if you if you create an environment literally
with your literature where you where you create that impression
by selecting certain passages and then miss applying them for
your purposes, yeah, it sure sure so does look like Jesus

(28:26):
fulfilled a whole lot of things.But again, it it goes back to
the point that Richard was making earlier, which I think
can't be emphasized enough. And and you know, Jeremiah, we,
we talked about this somewhat onthe last interview that there's
no form of authentic Judaism that is completely centered on a

(28:48):
single single individual. It just doesn't exist.
There's there's no, there's no, I mean I suppose you could make
the argument that Habad is sort of like that in some ways.
But you know, without getting into that, you know, just the
whole, the whole, the Hasidic, you know veneration of the Rebbe
and all that, but it's still different even in that context,

(29:10):
it's still not the same because you know, and this again this
goes back to my earlier point and I don't know if I'm, I'm
bearing off your question here but forgive me if I am but you
know it's easy to say. So I I know certain messianics
and I'm I know Richard probably does too.
And and perhaps we were both oneof them who who stridently make
arguments that well, if we stripaway later Christian doctrines

(29:33):
such as the virgin birth such asthe divinity of Jesus and the
Trinity such as a certain problematic things that would be
very problematic for anyone that's monotheistic.
If you strip all those away and you just proclaim that, well, he
was a man, he was a prophet, andhe was our Mashiach as a man,
Well, OK. So even if we embrace that, that

(29:55):
that straw man argument, it doesn't hold up on its own, as
Richard already stated, but you.But the problem I have is you
can't strip that away because the whole argument of Jesus as a
savior of the world is based upon those presumptive
principles. So if you're going to take away
the virgin birth and the deity of Jesus, you've just stripped

(30:17):
Christianity of any power or message that it has to the
world. What are we doing here?
There's no point to that. It's like, Nope.
Like, like I always liked what Robert Price said.
Like people see the story of Clark Kent and Superman, but if
you take Superman's power away from Clark Kent, who the heck's
interested in Clark Kent? Nobody wants Clark Kent.

(30:37):
They want Superman. So we can't have a messianic
Christianity that is divorced from Christian core doctrines of
salvation. And that's why ultimately,
messianic Christianity, I don't care what arguments that these
leaders want to make. And I know because I used to
make them You can't have your cake and eat it too.
You can't have Jesus, your savior, and have Judaism.

(31:02):
They're not compatible to each other.
They're totally different religious systems.
Judaism is not a salvation religion.
It's a community. It's a communal faith.
So I mean, and I, I don't think many Messianics really
understand that. I think they're so attached
emotionally to their personal image of who Jesus is that they

(31:22):
that they strive to try to justify.
I've seen people online that irritate me.
I can't even engage with them and they'll pick and choose and
and just comb the Jewish sourcesthe to try to find one of the
popular ones as they like to quote Rebbi Nachman of Bresloff
because he's always talking about Mashiach right.

(31:43):
So I've even had I had a guy with a straight face say I think
Rebbi Nachman was a secret Jesusfollower.
I mean he would roll in his grave if he were to hear that.
I mean you've got to be kidding me.
There's nothing that was opposite.
He Nachman was trying to strengthen Jewish belief amidst
persecution. He had nothing to do with Jesus

(32:05):
whatsoever. So the there's so many false
narratives that get promoted andI didn't.
To me it's always rooted in thisthis fantastical and fantasy
really emotional relationship they have with this God man.
If Jesus was really a historicalperson with a real history,
there wouldn't be this level of crazed devotion, because we have

(32:28):
great rabbis that we admire and and Revere from history.
But we see them as great men. We don't see them as
supernatural deities that came to earth, you know, then
ascended to heaven. That's not part of the Jewish
tradition. No, it's.
Not, yeah. Richard, did you want to go now?
Yeah, sure. I mean, David did an amazing,

(32:51):
amazing, fantastic job. Really.
And. And to be honest with you, just
to kind of pick where he left, you're right that Judaism,
Christianity and on the same plane level, we're not, you
know, Judaism can be true Christianity.
False, right? Christianity cannot be true
Judaism false. You know, we're not in the same
plane level here. And I mean, if you were to take

(33:12):
a person right now, for instance, and you throw them in
the middle of nowhere where that's enough, OK, they'll
probably read through and they're probably can, they
probably can come up with the idea that possibly there's some
kind of ruler that's going to come and redeem them.
But in reality, you need over Torah for a lot of this.
This is my whole point. You know what I mean?
Mashia, basically. Mashia is a Halaic issue, you

(33:36):
know what I mean? Because again, if you just based
it on what the Tanakh says, again, it's very few passages in
Tanakh they talk about this future Redeemer.
And again, if you, if we don't have like issues, then like what
are we looking at then anybody can come up with the idea of
Mushiya. So you know it's very
interesting again that Christianity, you know again

(33:56):
Judaism at one point had it right.
You know, according, you know, if we look at back in history,
at some point the rabbis had it right because again, this is
before the birth of Christianity.
The rabbis had everything right.But now all of a suddenly
something changed. Now now you know everything that
we have learned from Judaism. We just kind of tear down the
tree and we just start growing our own little tree.

(34:18):
And now, no, he's not coming onetime.
He's coming two times. I mean you know it's it's all
these things now get added into where you know, like guys you
know what did we get this from to begin with.
You know we we have to go back to tonight.
This is my whole point. So this is what's so
interesting. This is why I believe again just
elaborating everything David said it, it's it's been we're

(34:40):
not in the same playing field and this is the lie and and
that's the essence. The deceitfulness is that we
have to believe today that Judaism and Christianity really
are so close together. I mean the only thing that
separates us is the fact that webelieve in and and Christians
believe in. Yes, you, you know what I mean.
And Jews don't. But other than that, it's all
the same, and that cannot be further from the truth.

(35:01):
Right. That's a very good point, if I
might add, if I could interject,just a thought that was on my
mind related to what Richard just said he was talking about,
We have to go back to Tanakh. So the whole principle of Pashat
is you start, you have to start there before you go to the
esoteric. And one of the things that I
finally found really unnerving about the messianic movement,

(35:23):
and this isn't this isn't true of Hebrew Roots because they
don't deal so much with this. But it's really true of a lot of
the more intellectually robust elements of the messianic
movement is they run right to the sold level, they go right to
the sold level, and they attribute everything mystical
that this is an allusion to Jesus, This is an allusion to

(35:43):
our faith. And if you know anything about
Jewish learning in Yeshiva, you realize that that is an amateurs
approach to the tradition. That's not what you do.
The mystical isn't even taught until you've mastered the basic.
You have to learn. You learn Tara, you learn
Talmud, and then in the course of Talmud study.
If you have a skilled rabbi teaching you, he will expose you

(36:05):
to various mystical type arguments that are prevalent,
but it'll always be in the proper context of of your
understanding. So there's philosophy and then
there's basic truth. And so as Richard said I think
that's an outstanding point thatyou that whenever these things
get debatable you have to stop leading with the mystical.

(36:27):
Because that's the only real argument that the Messianics
have is if they can, if they canattach their Jesus to the
mystical religious tradition of Judaism.
Well now they now they've kind of gone in through a back door
and and it's and you know you know what we we know about
somebody who comes in through the back door of the house
without knocking is their intentions are not pure.

(36:48):
And I think I'm not saying that people are are not pure in their
intentions, but they're misguided in terms of their
they're driven by their emotional attachment to this,
this idea. And they'd be much better
served, I found always they'd bemuch better served like put your
Jesus aside and all your ideas about him and Start learning
Judaism the way Judaism is trulytaught and lived.

(37:09):
And I found that I've never experienced someone who does
that. And and this is another
important point I wanted to add,since it's on my mind, is that
most of these people are not involved in any way in authentic
Jewish community. They're on their own with their
little groups and they have their own little think tanks and
they and they congratulate each other with all their insights,

(37:31):
but but they wouldn't be able tofunction in an actual authentic
Jewish space because none of that would work there.
So I think that everyone that I know, including myself, that
actually took the honest attemptto try to understand Judaism
from its own arguments, not fromthe perspective of how do I fit
Jesus into this, end up leaving Christianity and attaching

(37:52):
themselves to Judaism. Because it's very obvious once
you do that, that while I was playing a game over here, this
is, this is a joke, you know? It's not really real.
And many I want to, I might add also, David, in many sense, what
they doing is exactly what they doing what's or not, you know, I
mean they're, they're ripping toknocks completely out of
context. And when they do they do the

(38:14):
same thing. When they go into the into the
Talmud into any of these missionary writings.
They go in there with a filter ready and and unfortunately this
they exactly what they doing with the Tanaka is what they
doing with the Talmud. One of the things that they will
never share with you is that youknow in a esoteric concept can
never override at the shot level.

(38:34):
You know this is fundamental in Judaism never ever.
I mean this is, you know, God forbid we can never do that.
So the concept is of course thatquoting a passage from the
Talmud, from the Gemara specifically.
And you know, again, just like they do with the with the
Tanakh, you know there it is, you see, but they don't read the
before and the after. They don't read the context of

(38:55):
to that. And this is completely and this
is mastermindful, this is what they do.
And unfortunately, you know, it's interesting that they go to
the Talmud, they go to the Gemara.
And most of these, most of thesegroups are the first ones to
tell you that the Jews are just filled with traditions.
Taliban is not valid. Gamara is not valid.
But yet that's what they go to support their.

(39:17):
I I just think that it's just you have to but laugh, you know,
it's like, why do you go there? I mean if Jesus is so obvious in
the Tanakh, why do you need to go to gamar?
Like that would be the last place that I would go.
Yeah. Can I can I jump in and say
something there? Because that's such a good
point. You know, like you're so
accurate with that. It is so, so true.

(39:39):
But that's exactly what they do.And if you study Talmud, you
understand. So the Gemara is a dialectic
discussion on the Mishnah. So you have to start with the
Mishnah. So you have a Mishnah, and
you'll have passages in the Talmud where you'll have a
Mishnah, and the Gemara will go on for for 20 pages before you
have another Mishnah. And so if you don't understand

(40:01):
the context, as Richard just said, of what this discussion in
the Talmud is, and you just cherry pick some some little
paragraph, you have no clue whatthe rabbis were talking about.
You're just appropriating it foryour own use.
Yeah. Oh, it's.
Horrible, yeah. So yeah, these are all really
great points. I want to hit three points.

(40:24):
Next one, how they get the festivals wrong.
Two, how they get the Tabernaclewrong and then how they get the
tanakh wrong. My preamble to the first
question is another wordy one. But how do messianics get the
festivals wrong? How do how do they get the
Passover lamb and Yom Kippur sacrifices wrong?

(40:45):
Now according to Christians, Jesus fulfills the Passover and
the unleavened bread is a Passover sacrifice for the sins
of the world. Was there ever a sacrifice for
the sins of the world or any sacrifice for another individual
than yourself in the Torah? Somehow he fulfills first
fruits. This is amazing.
The term only son in applies to Israel doesn't necessarily mean

(41:10):
begotten, it just means unique and application of Israel.
Talking in the Tanakh, the son of man, prophecy and scriptures
talking about a person that was born of a man, not a son of God
who's no earthly father. That would break the very
meaning of son of man. You have to be the child of a
man to be son of man. This is problematic.

(41:32):
It doesn't fulfill prophecy. Now while admitting he doesn't
fulfill Shovel or Pentecost, they still claim it's an
allegory that points to him. They say that he foreshadowed in
the feast of Trumpets Rosh Hashanah and fulfills Yom Kippur
1st. I'm going to ask you guys to
explain the Day of Atonement, what it does, how it isn't a

(41:55):
sacrifice for others and how it doesn't save people.
You know the world, but it's meant to inscribe you for a good
year, which you know, we asked for it Rosh Hashanah and then,
you know, feast or tabernacles. Somehow Jesus fulfills this
mistaken identity of crisis of the misused pageant passage in

(42:17):
Isaiah that a child you know sheis is with child.
They say it will be with child and then they like to say you
know the translation is God withus.
But Alma doesn't mean virgin in Isaiah.
We know it means young woman. So you know this whole
convoluted like now he's this Sukkot because God was manifest

(42:40):
in the flesh. So I want to in my question of
kind of summation of their Jesusin the festivals.
What this is not a they don't dothe research.
This is not a hermeneutical understanding of text.
They're not looking at text within context and within a
plain pashat, meaning where there's two or three witnesses
in Torah for anything that's going to lead to us having a

(43:03):
belief system. So how they even find a way to
put him in Hanukkah, which is inthe Talmudica, you know, holiday
that comes from the Apocrypha, you know.
Yeah. And then they point out he kept
Shabbat. The main problem with all of
these Jewish festivals is they are not Christian and they are

(43:24):
within Judaism and they're usingthese Jewish traditions that
they don't fully observe in their proper context to point to
a religion that doesn't follow those.
But now we should follow a new religion, despite pointing to
this whole grand foundation thatthey completely get wrong.

(43:47):
So how did they get the festivals wrong?
I did a small summary. Richard, you want to go first on
this one? Yeah, sure.
It's a it's a big question. I'll, I'll, I'll start.
Let's just start real quickly because I, I, I got about maybe
another close to 50 minutes before I have to leave.

(44:08):
But to kind of summarize everything here, well, let's
start with Passover real quickly.
And it's interesting that they say that he's the Passover land
and of course takes away the sins of the world.
But reality, when we look at theTanakh, the Passover is not
meant to really take away anybody's set #1.

(44:31):
It's not a it's not a Qatar offering #1.
So just right off the bat, you know, if anything, it would have
been, it would have been a bull,it would have been a young kid
for, you know, it would have been something like that, but
not not a lamb for Passover. Now what's interesting going
back to what Dave and I were talking about just a minute ago,
is that what they do is they take things out of context

(44:52):
completely. So it's interesting.
Why is it that in Egypt the Lambs were offered, you know,
what was the whole point of that?
Well, not to get again into intothe whole index study of this,
but, you know the Maharaj Rites and many of the other rabbis
write about this. And the the only intention of
this was that, you know, the Egyptian culture was immersed in
paganism and sacrificing this land was like the final deity.

(45:15):
This was actually a proof that we're getting rid of idolatry.
Just find it so interesting thatChristianity takes this to
actually go into idolatry when the very purpose of it was to
come out of idolatry. But going back to this, this
actually takes us back to Abraham when he takes Isaac to
the mountain, right. And he's got to offer it.

(45:37):
Again, the same concept in here,you know, if you continue
reading it doesn't say that Isaac was sacrifice #1, you
know, So again, this is where they, they rip completely things
out of content. They get into an esoteric
concept. You know, he wasn't sacrifice.
What's the point of that? Well, again, if you go back to
the studies of the ancient world, sacrificing a young child

(45:58):
was very, very common in the ancient world.
You know Abraham grew up in thatworld.
He would have understood this. Why the college Bible will send
them out to the month of the sacrifices.
Done quote UN quote. It was the same purpose.
Why it was said to the children of Israel to sacrifice the lamb
to show them what not to do. Like the whole concept, what

(46:20):
Abraham was a lesson to teach him that human sacrifice is not
acceptable. That's the whole point.
And it's interesting that they take that very same passage to
actually advocate human sacrifice when the whole thing
of that passage was to take awaythat.
So, you know, that's why it saysGod himself will provide the
land. You know, alluding to the
Passover land that will take place with the nation.

(46:40):
The same purpose, you know, it'sto get rid of idolatry.
And what was the, you know, you go back to the reading in
Genesis, it literally says why Isaac was taken to the mountain.
He was testing the faith of Abraham.
You know, that's really the meatof the teaching, is that you're
willing to let go everything that you find value in this
world for the sake of our college bountiful.
That's the that's the whole message in there.

(47:01):
Not sacrificing your son, not taking away sin.
By the way, doesn't even say anything about Isaac taking away
sins of the world. I mean, it's just completely
ridiculous. It's not even a hint of that in
the text anymore that there's a hint of that in the Passover
lamb. By the way, the Passover lamb
only affected first borns. So that will completely this
validate Jesus word because if you're not a first born and if

(47:22):
you were in Egypt that day and you were not a first born, it
didn't matter whether you have blood on the on the doorpost.
It didn't affect you. It was only for first born.
So what are we saying? I mean if we're going to take
this literally, that means that Jesus atonement only effects the
first born. If you're not a first born
child, then you're just going toperish in hell.
I'm just saying. I mean theologically this

(47:43):
absolutely makes no sense whatsoever.
So you know, again, it goes backto what David and I were talking
about. It's just they just take hearts
of Tanakh and insert esoteric concept in order to produce this
this issue that they believe in and and it's it's just mamish
appalling in my opinion. You know, it's it's, you know,

(48:04):
like why would you want to do such thing?
And by the way, if you have to resort to that kind of of
shuffle game in order to producethis, why would you want to be a
part of that? Now?
You know, grant that we were allthere Once Upon a time and we
were following what we believe was right because we were
taught. But the issue is not about the
ones that are there. What the issue that I'm hearing
is the people who are actually the truth is coming to them and

(48:26):
they insist and continue teaching this, you know, because
there's one thing if you teaching something out of
ignorance and you can blame people for, like I said, we're
all there. It's what are you doing now that
this troop is coming out, You know, what are you doing with
this information? So going back to the festivals,
OK, Passover is completely ripped out of compass.

(48:47):
We can see that this is the opposite of we leave what the
intent is. Well, I don't think I need to go
into the rest of them, you know,it's like, you know, the very
first one we already started offin the wrong foot.
I won't even go into the rest ofthem.
And again, it's just, it just proves right there the, this
validation of Christianity all together in the concept of
again, what they believe Mashiach is.

(49:08):
So I always like to make the difference, this difference
between the Jewish Messiah and the Christian Messiah.
You know, every nation had a Mashiach, by the way.
Every nation had a savior of some form.
It was what you get, you know, Hercules and all these other,
you know, Greek mythology, you get all these heroes there were
in one way or the other in our language, they they were
Mashiach. They were saviors, you know,

(49:28):
they were. They were ordained ones.
So it's a it's a matter of againgoing back to Tanakh and showing
what Tanakh says about what the function of Mashiach is.
Simply put and the story and it's interesting, most of the
messianic movement in including Christians and Hebrew roots one
thing they all have in common isthat they say we are so we are
only sola scriptura which literally means we only adhere

(49:53):
to what the what the written word of God says.
You know and when you look into their their and their document
and if theology or if you are here to sell us.
What are you coming with all this with all this machine.
You know this minutiae. You know that's just like
there's nothing remotely resembling this antenna.
So, you know, I believe personally, I think this is

(50:14):
completely an abomination in theeyes of Polish by we're taking
the concept of a bad man and putting him in the festival, by
the way, real quickly. This is the problem.
This is why I believe also Messianic Judaism, Hebrews,
Christianities, all in general, they're not learning.
They're not learning Tanakh because what they're doing is
all they're doing is they're trained to look for Jesus in the

(50:37):
Tanakh. Yes.
So you know, like you know like if you take the, the passage of
Abraham taking Isaac to the mountain, there's such a
beautiful teaching there. Well, that completely is this
mess. You're not gonna learn This is
the problem. They're not learning tonight.
Unfortunately, going in there and then certainly just looking.
You know it's kind of like a book.

(50:58):
A book has been colored for you.So you're going back just
looking for the colors, you knowand and you're not really
gleaning that the Passover in Egypt.
OK. This what this had to do with
removing idolatry. On the contrary.
You know. So this is the problem.
They're they're the way they're trained to do these things,
unfortunately, is doing a disservice to the whole
movement. Yeah.

(51:19):
No, that's fantastic. You all set, Richard.
Is that OK? I I also have to leave no later
than one. So I got about 40 minutes, maybe
less than that, about 30. So just riffing on something
that Richard shared a minute ago.
It was jumped in my mind as he was talking.

(51:41):
So Rabbi Jonathan Sacks in his introduction to the Macfur for
the for the holiday talks very eloquently about speaking, of
course, of Yom Kippur at this point about the, you know, the
controversy of the two goats, one which has the sins placed
upon it, one which is sent away.Of course, we discussed this in

(52:06):
the last interview. I'll I'll reiterate it here for
those who didn't see that or won't see that.
There's a lot of conflation in the Christian world between
Passover and Yom Kippur, which is largely not taught, taught or
understood at all in the Christian Church, and it's not
really understood in the Messianic world.
I think what Richard said is so accurate that, I mean, let's
face it. Well, let me finish my point

(52:28):
about Rabbi Sachs before I go off.
So Rabbi Sachs talks about in his introduction that the entire
Yom Kippur ritual, while it to an outsider who doesn't really
think or understand it looks brutal.
It looks like we know how what is, what is going on here.
And really in his view it was anactual protest against the

(52:50):
age-old long religious traditionof sacrificing people to appease
the gods. That that's that's what every
religious tradition that existedinto human antiquity has human
sacrifice. And so when you look at the
Jewish tradition of how we understand the drawing back to
Hashem, it's it's it's it's it'sexplicitly not human sacrifice.

(53:16):
It's it's it's the understandingof the reclamation and the
rectification of the human condition before God.
That there's this there's this symbolic as even as Rambam says
himself in Guide to the Perplex he says it is.
It is explicitly symbolic it is not literal.

(53:37):
And so the the just you know, asas Richard was saying the the
whole notion gets polluted in the Christian mindset because
everything is focused upon what Jesus did for me by dying.
And so that it colors the lens like, like, I think Richard just

(53:57):
very well said, you're not really learning Torah if that's
your foundation of understanding.
That has to get jettisoned out of your mind.
If you're going to truly understand Jewish philosophy and
spirituality, you just can't do it.
And and as you also mentioned, like, I don't have to go into it
now because you already covered it, but like Passover, this

(54:17):
whole idea that, you know, like my wife works in a supermarket,
she's a manager. And last year someone came up to
her because they knew she was Jewish and said and they
presented her with red ribbons and a card saying that this the
red ribbons, you know, we wantedto.
In other words she was trying toacknowledge Passover and and

(54:39):
throwing in a little missionary dig saying you know the ribbon
represents the blood that was put on the doors, which
represents Jesus, right. Well, even if I apologize for
laughing, but even if Jesus existed and claims to be what
the Christians say he was, even he would not have associated his

(55:03):
work on earth with what's going on in Passover.
Because it has nothing to do with saving souls, right?
There's no salvation that happens in Passover.
Nothing is that the the blood was simply, it was a sign that
you were identified and that youwere going to be spared the
curse. It was a plague, the death of

(55:25):
the first born. So even if you're a Jewish
family, as you just said in thatthat evening, what you were
spared was the death of your first born, your animals and
your children. There's no salvation in that.
The, the quote, UN quote salvation of the Jewish story is
the deliverance from bondage. That's the only you know, That's

(55:49):
the only salvation that exists, is that I'm going to take you
out as a people, not as a personal salvation.
God. That you have to make some kind
of a gnostic ascension of beliefand all of a sudden you transist
from this life of death and no hope to all of a sudden now you
have eternal life in Jesus because you suddenly believe

(56:11):
something you don't. I mean it's great to believe
things, but like in in Judaism you can say I believe I did a
wrong thing. I believe I did a sin.
OK well, in Judaism, you don't say, well, you know, Jesus has
me covered because he died for me.

(56:32):
No, it's OK. So what's your rectification?
You do repentance and you changebecause it's about our
relationship to each other. It's not.
It's like when, like Christianity, and I think
messianics really struggle with this.
Christianity is like a bunch of marbles in a jar.
Everybody's got their personal relationship with Jesus and then
they bring it into this community event and they and

(56:54):
they just look for people that they agree with that share their
own personal fantasy. And if they and if they don't
find that they're grooving with the people they're with.
They go find some other community that shares their
fantasy. And that's why you have 30,000
denominations of Christianity. Because everybody's trying to
find a fantasy Jesus that fits the model in their brain and
it's it's it's and it's just it's so disturbing.

(57:14):
And and the thing like, I guess the last thing I'll say because
I know we're we're going to be alittle short on time and I'll
just reiterate the story I told in my book.
I remember one of the the Seminole moments for me when I
was a messianic teacher and I was in a messianic synagogue.
As I remember the first time I participated in the high
Holidays with that Messianic congregation.

(57:36):
It was bizarre and it was profane.
And I remember standing at the back of the shul where the
library was because it was no seats during Yom Kippur.
And you have all these messianicChristians dressed in white and,
you know, doing the Hasidic thing.
And I'm thinking to myself as I'm standing back there like

(57:57):
this doesn't make logical sense.Like if I truly believe that
Jesus is my savior, Yom Kippur has no functional meaning for me
at all. And I think what happens to
these messianics? And this was the point that was
going through my head as Richardwas talking.
I just wanted to finish with this I don't.

(58:19):
I can't speak for each of you. I know I'll speak for myself.
My impression of most of the people who find themselves in
these Messianic congregations are people who, at some level,
either felt betrayed or hurt or disillusioned with their
Christian experience. And they gravitate to a
messianic expression because they're fascinated to learn this

(58:41):
new tradition of worship that they've never experienced
before. And it seems so romantic and it
seems so exotic even, that they end up actually getting proud of
the fact that they think that they're doing a form of worship
that their shallow brethren in the church don't know about, and

(59:03):
they can't wait to express it tothem.
Like you should come celebrate the holidays with us.
Oh no, I'll have you over for Christmas.
No, I'm not talking about that. We don't celebrate Christmas.
We do Rosh Hashanah. We do Yom Kippur and then they
invite people in that have even less knowledge than they do
about the the, the structure andthe function of these Jewish

(59:23):
traditions. And they get LED through them by
people who are believers in Jesus.
They're not rabbis. And even if they are rabbis, you
know, by ordination doesn't meanthey're really rabbis.
And and they and they get enraptured with this expression
without really thinking through what they're doing.

(59:43):
And as Richard said, it is an abomination to celebrate Yom
Kippur as a Jesus worshipper. It it's it's not what Yom Kippur
is at all and I would really implore I I think I don't you
know I I'm a big believer in freedom people you know having
the right to do what they want to do and and you we're never

(01:00:03):
going to stop anybody from from doing these things.
But it would be really nice if there was some type of an
educational apparatus that people would, at least on their
own. Because that's how I left it is
I I was always committed to learning and you know and I
think anybody who really commitsthemselves.
So if anybody's watching this I guess it's my last statement and

(01:00:24):
they're and they're trying to wrestle through maybe they are
in a messianic thing and they'restarting to question things and
they're and they just want to learn.
They want to go a little bit outside the box and and they're
listening to Richard and myself and you and I would just
encourage you don't you don't don't don't get mad.
Don't get upset. Just keep seeking authentic

(01:00:44):
sources of learning and challenge yourself to ask hard
questions. Because one thing I love about
Judaism, if you get involved in yeshiva style learning or or the
excitement of Jewish learning, is the dialectic.
It is the questions. It's not the doctrine.
It's not they don't we you know you're not going to get sat down
and said OK, here's the 10 things you have to believe or

(01:01:06):
you can't. It's what's your question and
let's discuss it and let's see what the Sages have to say about
it. It's it's an open conversation
and that doesn't exist in a world in which your mindset is
focused upon certain what we what the Church would call
cardinal doctrines of faith. And I think that that is really
a a big, a big, big problem thatthe messianic world has is

(01:01:28):
there's a lot of intentional andunintentional deception of its
members. That's why I do this podcast as
an educational resource. You know, I love the questioning
within Judaism. Questions are encouraged.
All right. So I know we're crunched on
time. So let me go ahead and I'll do
one last question. I got a little bit of a preamble

(01:01:50):
on it, and then maybe we can setup time to do the rest of it.
But this last one is Jesus is the fulfillment of the
Tabernacle. How do they get it wrong?
They claim that the Tabernacle teachings about Jesus teach the
message of salvation, the blood on the altar.
How is this a problem when you factor in human sacrifice?

(01:02:13):
Now Christians try to alleviate the human sacrificing.
It's not a human sacrifice. It's God, you know, giving
himself up, which is even more convoluted.
But there's still, I mean, he's part man, part God by their
theology, which probably isn't true and is made-up.
I mean, you know, as far as our understanding is concerned, he's
he was a man who died. But all of that aside, not

(01:02:36):
arguing the points of of that a man can only die for his sins.
You know a son can't die for hisfather, father can't die for his
sons, right? The sacrifice system was for
unintentional sin. How does one deal with
intentional sin in the Torah? How does God forgive sin in the
Torah to do what's right? You'll be forgiven if you make

(01:02:56):
teshuva. Man ask for forgiveness, you
know, repent and ask for forgiveness, you're forgiven.
Now according to messing Jews heought he fulfills the the
sacrifices on the brazen altar. Which I mean, I'm just saying is
it possible because human sacrifice would make it would be
an abomination and violate the temple that it's that's just

(01:03:18):
like and then somehow he he fulfills the the wash basin he
washes away your sins. This is just complete allegory.
Somehow he's the lampstand, providing light, I mean loose
connections, flimsy associationswith no scriptural foundation.
How is doctrine in the Torah made?

(01:03:39):
You know, like I stated earlier,it needs to be multiple,
consistent, clear attestation ofsomething, right?
And then the last part, somehow he feels showbread, the incense,
the sweet smelling aroma. And now here's the big one.
The myth of the rent veil. Why, if there was a rent veil,
is there no mention in the Talmud or Jewish tradition?

(01:04:01):
I mean, the veil is rent and youknow, things are shaking.
Maybe because it never happened.Why is that?
Not even in Jewish tradition, right?
And the center of the Tabernacleincludes the 10 commandments.
And yet Christianity doesn't uphold the Torah.
What did they get wrong about putting Jesus in the Tabernacle
do? You want me to go first?

(01:04:23):
Yeah, go ahead. Yeah.
So first of all, if you study Rashi regarding the brazen
altar, the brazen altar is is a Rashi and his linguistic.
His brilliant linguistic analysis of the pashat mentions
the concept of the brazen forehead, the insolent forehead,

(01:04:46):
that the brazen altar represents, the pride being laid
down. So something is dedicated to
destruction and in that effort to bring forth that which is
dedicated to destruction you areyou are dealing with the
insolent forehead, the the the thick headedness, the the stiff
neckness. And it's it's in the in the
messianic perspective that represents sacrifice.

(01:05:10):
And then the golden altar represents the blood of Jesus
because the the blood that the the the high priest sprinkles on
the golden altar is considered the atonement blood right?
When in fact, just really Simplyput, it begs the question if
what Christians and Messianics claim about Jesus fulfilling the

(01:05:33):
temple sacrificial system is true, then how can Judaism exist
today? Because there is no temple and
there is no sacrificial system. So this is a this seems like a
slam dunk argument to Christianswho don't understand the Jewish
tradition because well, I actually used to serve with a
pastor many years ago who had a Jewish doctor and he had, he had

(01:05:57):
the hutzpah to go to his doctor and say, how do you deal with
your sin if you're Jewish? Do you sacrifice animals in your
backyard? He actually said that to the
guy. I mean, this educated guy.
I mean, and he thinks he was smart, like, I'm, I'm going to
stand up for Jesus here, right? And it's so laughably ridiculous
because if you understand Judaism, you understand that

(01:06:18):
since the temple's destruction, what has replaced it is the
prayers. So the prayer services are they
mimic the the the traditional schedule of the morning and
afternoon sacrifice and evening.So so that and that's why the
prayers happen when they do. And that's also one of the
reasons why some of the benedictions are the way they
are is, is they mimic the ascentup the mount to come into the

(01:06:43):
presence of Hashem at the Temple.
And then and then you know the the conclusion of the ceremony
that the prayer service is very much structured that way.
It's got, it's got a a cadence to it.
So that's that's just one thing is that we have to understand
that if you go back to the peshat, you go back to the text
of of Torah, there is no sacrifice in the worship system

(01:07:07):
for intentional sin. It doesn't exist.
The most of the worship ceremonies at the temple
cleanse, the temple of the presence of the people
worshipping it's it's about so if there's no temple, thus
there's no sacrifices, you know,I mean and there's other ways to

(01:07:31):
discuss this. I mean, Richard may have some
more to say on that, but I'm just saying at a very functional
level, the whole concept that the sacrificial system was in
place until Jesus came is so flawed.
It's not true. If if the Second Temple was ever
built again, there would be a resumption, presumably.
And there was a lot of debate about this in the Jewish world.

(01:07:53):
I mean, this is not, I don't want to speak for the whole
Jewish world here, but presumably we're going to have a
renewal of the worship system, and it has nothing to do with
the atonement of sin. It has to do with the
rectification of people's cleanliness.
So you know the the the conceptsof atonement are misunderstood.

(01:08:13):
The Christian understanding of atonement is not right.
The concepts of holiness is not understood by Christians or
Messianics. Everything gets polluted by this
Jesus perspective and it's and it's just really disturbing
because of course we have the book of Hebrews, right, which
nobody knows who wrote it and obviously wasn't Paul.

(01:08:35):
But Hebrews goes into this long diatribe of Jesus being the
fulfillment of the temple and everything else and it it's
fantasy island that has nothing to do with anything.
So if I if I'm a Jew and I rap to fill in and I pray with

(01:08:55):
sincerity of heart, preferably with a minion or or or if I'm
alone, I'm participating in a communal act of faith
reasserting and re emphasizing my belief not only in God but in
my community itself. It's a communal act, you know,
it has nothing to do with my personal salvation.

(01:09:18):
So again, it's it's one of thesethings that you know, like
Christianity. I'll just go back to my original
point and then I'll shut up on this that all these debates that
Messianics make about, well, Jesus is this and Jesus does
this and he fulfills this and hefulfills that.
Before all those conversations have opportunity to have happen,

(01:09:38):
we have to deal with the fact that you are coming from a place
of Christian understanding on personal salvation, which is a
Pagan originated concept. It is just the same as Richard
alluded to earlier, it's just the same as the Mithra cult.
It's just the same as the Isis cult.
It's the same as the Krishna cult.

(01:10:00):
It's the same any of these dyingand rising savior gods, of which
there were many in the ancient world, all share this in common
that it's a it's a human sacrifice so that I can be
accepted by the gods. That is not part of Judaism at
all. Well, in the temple, sacrifices

(01:10:20):
were about the kedusha, the holiness of the temple to make
it holy so God's presence could come to the temple, not
necessarily the sins of the nation.
Richard, do you want to go aheadand give your take on how they
get that wrong? Yeah, I mean, David did a
fantastic job and really articulating that in a very,
very, very thorough way. In reality, when you look at

(01:10:43):
this, even when you look at this, and again, I like to
always stick to the basics, I think basics wins everything.
Jesus is crucified. He dies.
Some say 33. You know, year 3033.
Whatever you subscribe to, you're still looking at an
average of at least 36 to 40 years before the 2nd Temple was

(01:11:10):
destroyed. Now I believe it answers the
question. In my opinion, if if he is the
temple, as you know, we shouldn't subscribe and
everything that was about him inthe temple, then why was there
still a temple service for almost a whole generation after
his death? Like, again, this is

(01:11:32):
kindergarten. Again, I I I like, I love to
stick to basics because I believe basic wins the.
It wins the war, you know, it's just a very basic, at a very
basic level, we have a contradiction, not a variance, A
contradiction because we have temple service and by the way,
according to the book of Acts, we have four.

(01:11:54):
We have all his disciples partaking in temple service.
Like like what are these people are doing there?
You don't like the concept of him being the the ultimate
sacrifice and the temple himselfin the in the coin Haggadol.
Then what are they doing there? Again, it's it's one of those
things. But there is a reason Also going

(01:12:16):
back to young people. There is a reason why we read
the book of Jonah doing Yom Kippur.
And one of the reasons why we read the book of Yonah doing Yom
Kippur is because, again, it shows us how the nation truly
receives forgiveness. You know, the city of Jonah,

(01:12:38):
we're not talking about one individual, we talking a whole
entire city. It's interesting that you know,
in there, in the book of Jonah, it literally tells us, I mean,
there's many other passages was pouring Tanakh.
But specifically in here, we seethat an entire nation received
forgiveness, yet there's no hintof Mashiah.

(01:13:01):
There's no hint of one person having to die for the sake of
the whole nation. I mean, it's interesting.
Yom Kippur, we read this. And if again, if the idea of one
individual taking away the senseof an entire world, I think that
the book of Jonah would have been the perfect example of
that. Because we have a mass group of
people, we have an entire nationthere, we have a whole city.

(01:13:24):
Yet what is the prescription that it tells us in there?
That if they were to Shuba, you know, Shuba is the answer for
everything in tonight, you know,and it is to repent.
It is to, you know, essentially stop what you're doing, return
back to the God of Israel, and he opened with open arms,

(01:13:44):
receives you. This is a nightmare for the
church. That's the problem.
It's too simple for the church. We can just God.
There's no way God can do that. There's no way God can just
receives us just because we should run.
So the church has to appropriateand obviously make make this
man, you know in order to fit their their theology, all their
theological support on on how toreceive atonement.

(01:14:06):
But again it goes back to like David has expressed in here and
all of us, I believe it's you have to be able to fill all the
holes in the doctrine and unfortunately there's too many
of them. You know, it's, you know, the
more you cover, the more uncovering we see and that's

(01:14:27):
that's part of the problem. So you know young Kipper again,
we see clearly that this is about a nation coming to
repentance. We see this.
I mean, I I mean I don't have enough time to cover everything
in Tanak. That covers about how people
were forgiven and Tanak and it was simply Shuba.
And and again we still see and the proof of that is the actual

(01:14:50):
Christian Bible in itself. So when we see it and again
going back to the discrepancies,well, actually not discrepancy
and this is literally contradiction in this case, you
know, where we see the parable of Jesus, for instance, that's
the parable of the of the of theson, the waiver son.

(01:15:11):
And and it's amazing, you know, just reading this now, it's
brings so much life because. And here we see something very
interesting, the parable of here, of the of the son who goes
astray. The father is of course, wanting
him to come back. He has another son, right.
I'm kind of just real quickly here doing a quick synopsis in
it. And what happens is that the son

(01:15:33):
that remain gets angry because the father received the son that
went astray, he received them. You know, it's like the whole
parable actually encompasses Judaism.
It's the father opened the arms to the son that went astray.
All he had to do was just returnback.

(01:15:53):
And that's, you know, and this is what I'm saying, this is a
complete cut, this, this parableright here.
It's a nightmare for the church because literally contradicts
the whole concept of vicarious atonement, to be honest with
you. And we see it right there in the
parable. So the parable in itself the the
temple standing for at least again at a minimum at you know

(01:16:14):
35 to 40 years you know after the death of of of Jesus.
I mean we would have find that if this was all true again why
did the temple didn't get destroyed the same day?
Forget about the veil being read, I want to see the whole
temple destroyed. Even further than that, to
incriminate themselves by putting it in their own
scriptures that they offered sacrifices, right?

(01:16:36):
Right in Acts 21 as you. Alluded to after his death, they
participated in temple sacrificeabsolutely.
And according according to some traditions, James might have
been some form of Contra Cohen Gadol or some kind of leader of
their movement, or something like they participated at a high
level, allegedly. But this goes back to what we

(01:16:57):
started with this interview. It yes it does.
Very, it very difficult because you have these contradictions in
the Christian Bible and you haveto fish through them and really
subscribe to what you believe with no technical historical
support or theological support for any of it.

(01:17:17):
So I mean I'm in the subscription of course I'm going
to subscribe to Judaism because that's that's the the standing
religion that's that's remain. So yes, we believe that you know
the Temple service is important of course we believe that the
prayers are important. We believe that the way we get
forgiveness, we come to the Father and he, you know, we
shove up from the, from the, from the pure heart.
You know, none of this is contrary to Tanakh, essentially.

(01:17:40):
But the problem with the Christian Bible is that you
don't know what this is scribe. That's the problem.
You have instances where it appears that Jesus is a very
thorough observant and he is submitted to the Pharisees and
the saddest, you know, to the Pharisees, not the saddest and
the Pharisees. And you know, he's he's, he's a
highlight Jew. He's so much about the whole 9
yards, but then you have all thepassages that he completely does

(01:18:03):
a whopping 180 and walks contrary to the Pharisees
literally causing sons of devilsin the public.
You know, he claims that you know he is the only way to the
father. I mean these are things that
you're going to find in in in the in the passages and the
narrative of the passages of thegospel.
So that's the unfortunate part. You know, you got passages where

(01:18:24):
we see the virgin birth, You know, like in Matthew, Luke.
But yet Mark. Doesn't have it Not only doesn't
have the virgin birth, doesn't have the resurrection either.
And that and that. You know, what's always crazy is
Mark is supposedly the first gospel, right?
And it and it doesn't have the two things that are so core to
their whole belief system. Like what's up with that?
Like, didn't they share notes before publishing this stuff?

(01:18:46):
You would think. Absolutely and.
I mean that's the theory that they that they used each other,
but may not be the case or to some degree.
Right. Well, and this is the problem
really, with Christianity Today,why it's so divided, why it
really is not standing, It's falling apart and fall apart.
It's because, again, there's no core to anything.
You know, like you cannot even look to the very own book.

(01:19:08):
At least as as Jews, we can lookto the Tanakh and we have
answers, you know, to the four elements of our doctrine,
Christians. Jesus has been reduced to Super
Bowl commercials where they say Jesus gets you.
Absolutely that's. Where Christianity is going,
it's just an emotional appeal. When when you don't even have
any, you know, it's one thing. You know as Jews we have the
Tanakh. You know, every Jew looks at the

(01:19:29):
Tanakh as you know that is the the, the, the inspired word of
Hashem. We also have our oral traditions
to help us understand these things.
But when you are subscribing to our faith that even your own
book does not give you a solid answer, that is very, very
problematic and actually extremely dangerous in my
opinion. Yeah, well you have to suspend

(01:19:52):
logic to believe in the New Testament.
It's only works on faith-based and cognitive dissonance.
You can't have sound reasoning if you believe in the New
Testament and sola scripture. Because the contradictions in
the New Testament, you know, Nineveh didn't need a savior,
they simply did to Sheba to repent.
There was no sacrifice. There's no vicarious atonement.

(01:20:13):
Now something I'm dealing with in my history.
Jeremiah, can I interrupt you for one second?
I I apologize, but I really haveto fly.
I have to go. I have 1/2 hour ride.
I have an appointment. OK.
But this has been wonderful. I just want to thank you guys,
both of you for the opportunity.Richard, it's wonderful to meet
you and hear. Your perspective.
I really enjoyed it. Yeah.
Yeah. And but I'll have to duck out.

(01:20:33):
So thank you. OK.
Hopefully we can do this again. I had like 1 little last point I
wanted to make there and then let you guys give a closing
statement. If you gotta go, you gotta go.
I have to go. Unfortunately I.
Can't. OK.
All right. Well, anything last words for
you dip out? Just really appreciate this.

(01:20:56):
And my hope is that this will help some people because we've
all dealt with people like ourselves who have struggled
with some of this stuff. You know, we're not, I don't
think any of us here are speaking to the church at large.
We're speaking to the people that we've cared about, that
we've in some cases ministered to or tried to, and then we've
discovered, I guess you could say, the error.

(01:21:19):
And we're not trying to attack anyone.
We're simply trying to let you know that, hey, there is a path
here. And if you're having doubts and
if you're starting to look and things aren't adding up, follow
your instincts on that because you're right, it's not adding up
and and there is a better path for you.
So whatever that path is, it's certainly not messianic, Judy.
So anyways, yeah, so we can do another one.

(01:21:40):
I know there's several topics you didn't cover.
Yeah, there was plenty to still cover, but yeah.
I just, I can't afford to be late so.
No, I no, I understand that. You know, we all have day jobs,
so. Well, thank you guys.
Yeah. Thank you.
Looking. Forward to reading your book.
Oh, thanks. Yeah, he can hook you up with
it. I appreciate it.
Yeah, yeah. So what I was saying is that the
Western world was won by Christianity.

(01:22:03):
The Roman Empire, you know, tookover the world.
And then after the Roman Empire,Catholicism influenced through
the Dark Ages and then we have the Enlightenment.
This the age of, you know, reason that's come, you know,
the world order, the Western world order has been founded on
Christianity. And you know, it's been falling
apart as science and reason become more of the foundation.

(01:22:25):
And it's because I'm doing a history class right now.
It's something I'm really kind of diving into.
It's interesting how these ideasof this religion that is a
faulty foundation has been used to manipulate the whole entire
Western world and how that is falling apart.
But there's a struggle. You know, as we move towards

(01:22:46):
science and region, reason and logic, the religious zealots
want to rise up. And we're seeing that in our our
current political election cycle.
I mean, it's a constant struggleand we are still in the middle
of science and reason and this religious zeal.
And so even this stuff still hasa practical application.

(01:23:07):
You know, my concern is kind of,as we talked about to, you know,
encourage towards enlightenment of seeking things grounded in
facts based in history, plain understanding of things.
I know you got to get going here.
So I'm not going to belabor the point, you know any last
response, any last words for yourself as we kind of closing
out here. Yeah, I I again, just kind of

(01:23:30):
like what David said, We, we, wereally, really, it's been an
honor to be here and to be a partaker of this.
We want to be able to share thiswar with everybody.
And again, this is not a direct attack specifically against the
church or any particular denomination per SE, but I
believe that we are in that season.

(01:23:51):
As many of the rabbits say, we are in that era of Mashia.
He's not here yet, but we're in the era of Mashia, which means
that there's an awakening. I believe This is why you and I
are here and why so many people are all the suddenly just coming
out of the church. People are just by flock are
coming out of the churches. They're coming out of Mesianic
Judaism. Many of them are becoming Benay
Noah. Many of them are converting.

(01:24:12):
But the the the key element in here is that they're coming out
of the churches. Why why is this all the suddenly
taking place is because again I believe that's what the rabbi
saying that we are in that era and this is the time to be able
to to spread really the Ms. it'svery, very important that people
need to know the Mississippi. And you know, without it we'd be

(01:24:36):
doing essentially this this favor.
You know, we were once there. We understand how that feels
like. And I know that for most, I
believe a good part of the people in the Mesianic movement
generally are there because theythey feel that Mesianic Judaism
is a more authentic way of serving, you know, God in the
Messiah because this is a littlethe Jew as we started this this

(01:24:57):
interview today. So they're really, truly
seeking, I believe that through this time in the season we are
going to see more people coming out.
And and again, of course, we're going to see people who don't,
who just love the church at the end of the day.
So the proof is going to be right now and this time in the
season when the truth is coming out, we're going to find out
really who are the ones who truly love God with all their

(01:25:19):
heart and all their soul and want to cling to him.
And I think that this is really exciting times that we live in
it we live in right now. Yeah, well, this was really
good. I'm glad to have you guys on a
really good discussion. You know, I agree that there are
those that probably that, I mean, they do come with an
authentic reason of wanting to experience, you know, an early

(01:25:42):
form of Jewish Christianity theythink existed.
Unfortunately, they're falling into an inauthentic practice
that's cultural appropriation. Playing dress up doesn't
understand the sources of the text.
Isn't teaching authentic Judaismisn't teaching what Jesus, if he
existed, would have done. And so it's a misrepresentation.

(01:26:03):
And relying on, you know, textual criticism, historical,
you know, critical scholarship, historical archaeology, trying
to uncover the past is one way to bring you know the cachet of
history you know, to use the word.
But we're looking at the plain meaning of history.
Look at history as it is plainlyand then try to figure out what

(01:26:25):
that means to us and then contextually kind of
contextualize all this stuff. But I really appreciate you guys
for coming on and I know everybody's going to enjoy.
Enjoy this discussion and everyone watching.
Make sure you like and subscribe.
Follow and share this with your friends and family and TuneIn
next time for more great discussions and thank you Have a

(01:26:50):
good one. Thank you.
Thank you. Thanks for doing.

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Deconstructing Messianic Myths: Exploring Disparities (Past Leaders Discuss Mashiach & True Judaism): Episode 22

On Purpose with Jay Shetty