Your gracious invitation to me, to present a series of addresses concerning the basis of my personal faith and hope, places me very deeply in your debt. I am honored beyond my ability to express it, yet I must confess to some trepidation. This is not to say there is any lack of trust in my own conviction. Rather, I am concerned that I may not be able to communicate it to you in a manner that will allow you to question meaningfully what I hold as truly basic.
First of all let me state that I am perfectly aware of the conditions accompanying your invitation. After delivering one introductory message of a general nature, I am to address myself to specific questions that you will raise and wish to hear discussed. I am to hold myself open to any direct questions that you may pose.
This is eminently fair. I do not like hit-and-run tactics, and deplore the idea of making the speaker's rostrum a place from which to fire away in a one-sided duel. I shall welcome your questions, and I trust that you will feel under no constraint of modesty or respect for my person, but will "pour in the grape shot." I am as anxious as you are to find the weak spots in my armor, and you will be my best friends if you will point out any errors in my thinking. Henri Frederic Amiel wrote in his Journal that the condition of real knowledge is the emancipation from error.
By way of introduction, I should like to do two things: detail for you my past experience and relationship with Jews in matters pertaining to religion; and tell you how I expect to conduct myself, along with my reason for choosing this course. I can assure you that my concern for Jews does not stem from a mass psychosis, or a guilt complex occasioned by the way Jews have been treated by some who have professed to be Christians. Much of the shameful history of pogroms and purges I would like to blot out, for I do not condone it. Nevertheless, its sordid stain remains upon the pages of human behavior.
If I were inclined to feel a sense of guilt over such matters, I would have ample grounds for doing so. I grew up in a provincial mining community, among people who were prejudiced for the most part. This feeling was projected toward any who were not white Anglo-Saxon Protestants. Anyone who was "foreign" and "different" was an object of suspicion, calumny, and hostility.
As a boy, I never heard of a black person who was designated anything but "a nigger." Apparently all whose skin was dark were regarded as damned, for I cannot recall a black man being called simply "a nigger." It was always "a damned nigger."
This feeling extended in some degree to all others who were regarded as foreigners and usurpers. In the absence of police, children were threatened by being told, "Old Toby will get you, if you don't behave!" Toby was a harmless Syrian pack-peddler, who traveled through the country selling packets of needles, spools of thread, combs, lace, and other imported articles. He was polite and deferential, but his skin was darker than ours; he spoke an alien dialect; so we were afraid of him.
We called Hungarians who worked in the mines "Hunkies." We called Germans "Krauts," and the Jewish merchants who sold us our shoes and clothing, "Kikes" or "Sheenies." I am now aware of how vulgar and ignorant such expressions are, but we were that kind of people. It was a long time before I learned that the boorish term "kike" was actually bestowed merely because of the ending of Russian-Jewish names. It didn't matter that some who bore those names were the greatest benefactors of the human race.
I will not forget the day when I came to realize that the word "Sheeny," which was bandied about in our uncouth way, probably was derived from the Yiddish, sheyneh layt. This means "beautiful people," a term used to designate the educated, the cultured, and the wealthy.
Our prejudice was not limited to racial or ethnic differences, however. We felt such hatred toward Roman Catholics. We repeated all of the unfounded stories about their "underhanded plot to capture America." Popular were the scare sheets of yellow journalism that constituted our news media. These served to inflame passions and, on occasion, to incite riots against people whose only crime was that they were different. We were fully convinced that the basement of every Catholic church building was an arsenal for arms, and that the people went to Mass to learn the secret passwords, so that when the time came they could march forth and conquer our fair land for papal domination!
I am grateful for having been delivered from all of this, and I attribute it to the grace of God. Those of you who are humanists will have a different explanation, and it may be necessary for me to explain my position at another time. Presently my concern is to assure the psychologists in our group that I am not approaching these dialogues as a means of purging my conscience of guilt complex stemming from my early environment. Obviously, I am ashamed and deeply regretful of the unwholesome attitudes it engendered. The rays of the sunlight of love have driven from my heart those mists of prejudice and hatred. I am able to love you all, and to do so sincerely.
Several years ago I reached the decision that I must cultivate an understanding of my Jewish friends. I resolved to go among them and enhance the friendship I felt toward them. In high school I was captain of a debating team, and my immediate colleague was an outstanding Jewish student. We were together a great deal, much of the time in his home. I found him a man of scholarly depth.
When I began to feel the need of closer association, I started with the Reformed Jews, and frequently attended the largest and most prominent temple in our city. Several of you are members of it. As I became better acquainted with the rabbi and the minister of education, I was often asked to speak words of greeting to the congregation gathered for Sabbath services. The principal research for one of my books was done in the temple library.
I enrolled in the annual School of Judaism, and became the only non-Jew in the classes. I eagerly sought to learn the Jewish mind and heart. Eventually I went to the Hillel Foundation House, where I could have a share in the open discussions with students at the university. These were meaningful encounters with sharp young minds, some of them recently having come from kibbutzim in Israel. The rabbi was good to me, and we became close friends. Later I visited the president of Beth Abram, an Orthodox synagogue, and he permitted me to come after the evening prayers and talk at length with the cantor and himself. I felt quite Jewish indeed, when I donned the yarmulke in order to enter the building. I mention these things so that you will all realize that, both by reading and by personal experience, I have been preparing for this occasion. I am still learning, for your traditional proverb is correct: "The Torah has no bottom."
I shall not refer to myself as a Gentile, since some of you do not like the word as a designation. All of us are aware that words change their connotation, and frequently maintain an aura from the past. I shall speak of Jews and non-Jews, and you will have no difficulty in knowing of whom I speak when I refer to the non-Jewish community.
Another thing that I will not do is quote what I refer to as the New Covenant Scriptures as authoritative for you. I recognize them as the complement of the Jewish Scripture, and personally hold that they furnish a fulfillment of the prophetic Scriptures, which some of you cherish. But you do not regard them as representative of a New Covenant. To do so would mean that the covenant made with your ancestors at Sinai has been superseded, and this you will not concede.
No body of writings can be used as a standard of arbitration unless its authority is recognized by both parties involved. I must either convince you that what I refer to as the New Covenant Scriptures are a revelation from God, or I must not use them as I would in any dispute with those who profess to be Christians. There are such disputes, as I am certain you know.
I am fully aware that not all of you recognize the Jewish Scriptures as being genuine. Two of you have informed me that you are atheists, and several have told me you are agnostics. While it seems almost inconceivable to me that a Jew could be an atheist, we invite those of you who claim to be, to be our guests, and to ask any questions that you wish. In replying to such questions however, I shall quote from the Jewish Scriptures as authoritative. Our present dialogue does not involve the question whether there is a God, but whether an historical figure, Jesus of Nazareth, is the Messiah and Son of God. I shall proceed upon the basis that God exists, and if I cannot prove that He does, no atheist can prove that He does not.
We welcome the honest agnostics in this forum, for in some aspects and areas of life we all are agnostic. All of us are forced to say that we do not know about many things. It is no sin to be an agnostic, but it is a sin to remain one deliberately, when you can know. To be an agnostic of convenience in order to evade the responsibility that results from knowing, is to be a little less than honest. I have no quarrel with one who is blind, but I am suspicious of one who does not see only because he will not open his eyes.
Whether or not those who grant such allegiance are called by a particular designation is of little consequence. The first followers of Jesus were Jews, plus a few proselytes to Judaism. Many of these were persecuted, and some of them even died for their faith in Jesus as the Messiah. They never were designated as Christians and never knew that anyone ever would be. The first man to die for his faith in the messiahship of Jesus was a Hellenistic Jew named Stephen. He knew nothing of being called a Christian, and would not have recognized the name if he had heard it
It was not until the message of Jesus was taken to the non-Jews, that this word was applied to His followers. It is still a question whether it was a term of derision given by the opposers, or a name of divine sanction. Some of the arguments on both sides of that issue are weak and unconvincing to the honest researchist. In any event, if thousands of Jews became disciples of Jesus and lived and died as such without ever being designated Christians, thousands more may do so with the sanction of the Holy Spirit.
I want every person on earth to know Jesus as I know Him, but if those Jews who come to trust in Him constitute simply a Messianic synagogue rather than what the world designates "the Christian church," I shall be as thrilled to know that we are one in Him. It is not necessary that you abandon your culture or others seek to become Jews in order to be members of the one body. Our relationship with God and with one another in the Messiah is not to be organizational or institutional, but personal.
If you are in the Messiah and desire to circumcise your sons on the eighth day, that is both your privilege and your liberty. You have a perfect right to thus remind your offspring that they are descended from Abraham after the flesh, and are in the lineage of the fathers, Isaac and Jacob. Even Jesus was circumcised, you know.
In the Messiah, you may observe the Sabbath, if you desire. This will call to mind that on this day your fathers began the exodus from the slavery of Egypt and became a free people. I cannot help remarking that, if some of you began to observe the Sabbath in the Messiah, it would be more than you do outside of Him. You would likewise continue to observe Sedar, and set the family table with the roast lamb, the bitter herbs, and matzos. This is your celebration of freedom from enslavement by a cruel nation and its ruler. I am not about to judge you regarding holy days, sabbaths, or new moons, just as I refuse to be judged by others in respect to these matters.
When we come to trust in the righteousness of God, rather than in our own righteousness by law-keeping, it is important to place life in proper perspective. We must realize that it is not a mere matter of doing or not doing things. Rather, it is the transformation from within that makes it possible for us to use the provisions of the world without abusing them. A tree is a beautiful creation, providing much for the comfort and relief of man. Carved into an idol and worshiped, however, it becomes a frightful object. We always must maintain things in their proper place.
Above all else, I do not want any of you to feel that an acceptance of Him whom I regard as the Messiah is in any way related to becoming artificial, American, cultural non-Jews. Whether or not you ever set foot inside an American-style religious edifice is not at all important to me. If you are born from above, as I believe that all of us must be, and come into that life which is the light of men, I will praise God. I will continue to praise Him if you never constitute anything visible but a synagogue of Messianists.
I regard myself as a messenger to deliver back to you what you bestowed upon humanity, with an accrued blessing. All I have to bring to you is what your fathers generously gave to the world. The prophets all maintained that their message was not the end, but merely the harbinger of greater things to come. Theirs was a message of hope to be realized later. I have no intention, therefore, of imposing upon you an alien system or a non-Jewish philosophy. Instead, I seek to enter into that fullness which was read in the Torah, the haftarah, and the Hagiographa. This is not to imply that we have a superior insight, so that we can come and explain your prophecies to you. They are our prophecies also, when we embrace them in their fruition. Surely he who breaks bread of the heads of grain has nothing to boast of over him who planted the grain, or even the original seed and stalk. None of us has aught of which to boast, for all we have, including life itself, has been given to us. All of us simply share in the grace of the one God, and all of us are equally in need of it.
I owe my special thanks to the Jews for the rich heritage they have preserved for humanity. They are beloved for the sake of their fathers. It was Abraham who, having heard the call of God, forsook an idolatrous world and became God's pilgrim, searching for a better land. He was the first person of whom it was said that he believed God, and his faith was counted to him for righteousness. Thus, the very idea of justification by faith originated with Abraham. If I can capture this magnificent thought for my life, I can be said to walk in the steps of Abraham.
To me, the brotherhood of faith is more meaningful than that of the flesh. The latter is involuntary, an accident of birth, but the other is by choice. I cannot attain righteousness by having been permitted to enter the world as a part of a certain family strain. No combination of genes and chromosomes can provide admission to God's grace. Our standing will not be by paternity or pedigree, but by the power of God.
I am also grateful that the oracles of God were committed to Israel, and were preserved inviolate through all their encounters. From a child I have known these sacred writings, and they have thrilled my being. My heroes became these ancient worthies, and as I grew in years I grew in respect for their staunch devotion to the God of Abraham.
It is my conviction that the preservation of the Jews is a direct proof of the continued providence of God. The Jews, found in almost every country under Heaven, stand as a continual testimony to the unchangeable promise of God. Driven by fate and harassed by human hate, they have survived indescribable torture and cruelty.
Many of the people who enslaved the Jews have faded into the gray mists of history. Not a single one of their progeny remains on the earth. But the promise of God was that, as long as the sun shone and the moon beamed, He would not forget His promise to Jacob. So I trust that you will forgive me if I say that my heart beats with renewed hope as I look into your faces this day. The fact that you live is an additional proof to me that our God is a living God. I am also convinced that your people will survive until the sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon shall be turned into blood.
Jesus was cradled in the womb of a Jewish girl, who delivered Him into this suffering world in the little town of Bethlehem. We know who the Roman Caesar was, we know who the Jerusalem Herod was, at that time. We know how long Jesus lived, and we know when and how He died. The attestation for these facts is so strong that to deny them would obligate us to deny anything else that happened at the same time or previously.
Our real problem is not whether or not there was such a person. It is rather a question of who He was, His real identity. Was He the Son of God? If so, how can we know for certain? If He was, what difference will it make in my life now? It is absurd to pretend that there are no problems among us. When two people meet and one of them affirms that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God and the Messiah of the prophets, and the other denies both, obviously a problem exists.
I refuse to be guilty of that form of subterfuge called compromise. In the past this has been indulged in as an attempt to make both sides feel good. Generally such compromise takes the form of admitting that Jesus was "a son of God," in much the same sense that all of us are sons of God. He believed in God and sought to order His life in conformity to the will of God, and thus He could be referred to as a son, a follower, or a disciple of God.
I reject this as wholly untenable. When I speak of Jesus as the Son of God, I mean that He was such in the unique sense. I regard Him as divine, and hold that in Him the fullness of Godhood was embodied. On this matter there can be no surrender. I must stand or fall by this conviction. If Jesus is not who He professed to be, the whole superstructure of which I am a part must come tumbling down.
My future is not dependent upon my subscription to a sounder philosophy or a superior code of morals. I do not rest my hopes nor risk my soul upon a system of rationalization about spiritual matters, but upon reconciliation with God, made possible by the atonement of Jesus. If He is not the Son of God, my hope rests in a house of cards held together by wisps of anxiety, and doomed to dissolution and disillusionment. If Jesus is proven to be a sham, I have nothing to offer you that should command your attention.
So I have placed my all on one prime fact, the greatest in the universe: God broke through the horizontal history of men on the vertical, and where He bisected it, He left a cross. It is in this cross I glory, and it is this conviction I must defend. I am prepared to defend it in our subsequent gatherings. I shall welcome your questions for our future meetings, and I sincerely pray that God will bless all of you, and those who are dear to you, until we meet again.