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Why Should Jews Accept Jesus as Messiah?
A Pew Moments with Perry – Why Should Jews Accept Jesus as Messiah?
A discussion between one believing in Jesus and a modern Jew centered on why today’s Jews should believe in Jesus. After making an affirmative argument that Jesus did claim messiahship and deity, the counter argument was that Jesus’s conception of the messiahship was and is far different than the accepted position of rabbis for the last two millennia. Then the affirmative argument suggested the resurrection – and even modern sceptics accept the fact of an empty tomb – affirmed the truth of Jesus’s radical reinterpretation. Why would God raise from the dead a heretic? These are valid arguments for Jesus and our belief in Him. However, briefly, I would like to suggest two other arguments.
1. The counter argument that Jesus’s view was contrary to the common rabbinic view is ironically an argument that Jesus was correct. Consider this fact as evidence to which even religious Jews would affirm – How often did God send prophets to correct the views of His people, even their teachers!? The Torah is filled with such examples. Jesus is such an example. Jesus is The Prophet sent to correct their thinking.
2. The destruction of the temple is another argument for Jesus’s messiahship and His interpretation of that office. While Jesus prophesied concerning its destruction is factual, not all accept that due to the perception that miracles cannot happen, or that the gospel accounts could have been written post-destruction. So, let’s dispense with such arguments by going in a different direction.
What is not debatable is the temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. History records its destruction on the same date as the first temple! That can’t be coincidental. But let’s keep going. Why was the first temple destroyed? One answer is idolatry. Another answer is the Jews rejected the prophets God sent to correct their thinking. The destruction was God’s punishment for their refusal to believe.
Why was the second temple destroyed? The Jews had long given up the sin of idolatry. And yet, the destruction was God’s punishment again. Consider this as the reason – The Jews again rejected God and The Prophet God sent to correct their thinking. God destroyed the temple because His people refused to believe.
Both reasons affirming belief in Jesus as the Messiah, Son of God, Son of Man, God Incarnate, are connected. God sent prophets, and then God sent The Prophet to correct His people’s thinking and their refusal to believe.
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