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Since the groundbreaking publication of Postmissionary Messianic Judaism (2005), Mark Kinzer has challenged theologians and religious leaders to consider the essential ecumenical vocation of Jewish disciples of Jesus. Proposing a bilateral ecclesiology in solidarity with Israel, he argued that the overcoming of Christian supersessionism required a robust affirmation of the distinctive calling of Jews within the community of Jesus the Messiah. In this way, Kinzer's work put the issue of Jewish followers of Jesus on the theological agenda for those seeking a reparative reconfiguration of the relationship between the church and the Jewish people. In recent years, Kinzer has attended to the theological implications of this perspective and has widened his focus to include not only the Messianic Jewish movement but also Jews within Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant churches. The present collection of essays reflects this wider concern. According to Kinzer, the theological stones of contention are Christology conceived of as Messianology, ecclesiology understood as Israelology, and eschatology imagined as Zionology. Moreover, it is the presence of Jewish disciples of Jesus that concretizes these theological abstractions in the form of Jewish flesh and blood, summoning Jews and Christians to rethink their relationship to one another in ways that express their essential mutual dependence.

La Declaracion del Concilio Vaticano II sobre las relaciones de la Iglesia con las religiones no cristianas (Nostra aetate) transformo la vision catolica del pueblo judio y la tradicion religiosa judia. Afirmando que «al investigar su propio misterio» la Iglesia descubre su vinculo con la «estirpe de Abraham», este documento daba a entender que el misterio de Israel es inseparable del misterio de la Iglesia. Como misterios entrelazados, cada comunidad necesita de la otra para comprenderse a si misma. En Al investigar el misterio de la Iglesia, el destacado teologo judio mesianico Mark S. Kinzer sostiene que la Iglesia todavia tiene que explorar adecuadamente las implicaciones de Nostra aetate para mejor comprenderse a si misma. La nueva ensenanza catolica acerca de Israel debe dar lugar a nuevas perspectivas en diversos campos de la teologia cristiana, como la cristologia, la eclesiologia y la teologia de los sacramentos. Con este proposito, Kinzer propone una eclesiologia de Israel arraigada en la cristologia de Israel, en la que una restaurada ecclesia ex circumcisione (la iglesia procedente de la circuncision) asuma un papel crucial como signo sacramental del vinculo de la Iglesia con el pueblo judio y de la eleccion irrevocable del Israel genealogico.

This book is the dogmatic sequel to Levering's Engaging the Doctrine of Marriage, in which he argued that God's purpose in creating the cosmos is the eschatological marriage of God and his people.. God sets this marriage into motion through his covenantal election of a particular people, the people of Israel. Central to this people's relationship with the Creator God are their Scriptures, exodus, Torah, Temple, land, and Davidic kingship. As a Christian Israelology, this book devotes a chapter to each of these topics, investigating their theological significance both in light of ongoing Judaism and in light of Christian Scripture (Old and New Testaments) and Christian theology. The book makes a significant contribution to charting a path forward for Jewish-Christian dialogue from the perspective of post-Vatican II Catholicism.

Rabbi Gordon Fuller and Dr. Christian van Gorder are committed to helping people of both faith traditions gain, as far as is possible, a participant's appreciation of those from the other community. This means addressing misconceptions and misrepresentations as well as challenging widely held assumptions. Jews and Christians Together delves into the strained relationship between these two faith communities and exposes why these communities need to come to a better understanding and appreciation of the other. Events such as the attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania demonstrate why society must address and foil anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism wherever and whenever such views appear. The efforts of Fuller and van Gorder to explore these issues with their own faith communities can provide a helpful starting-point to confront trends of increasing hate and bigotry towards Jews today. Fuller and van Gorder ask us to acknowledge the marred history of Christianity and anti-Semitism, so that we can explore healthy Jewish-Christian dialogue and gain a shared and constructive mutual respect.

Over fifty years ago, Vatican II's Nostra Aetate 4 drew from Romans 11 to challenge the way Paul's voice has been used to negatively discuss Jews and Judaism. The church called for Catholics to conceptualize Jews as'brothers'in'an everlasting covenant,'and many other Christian organizations have expressed similar sentiments in the years since. Nevertheless, the portrayal of Jews as'branches broken off,''hardened,''without faith,''disobedient,'and'enemies of God'whom Christians have'replaced'as'true Israel,'are among the many ways that readers encounter Paul's views of Jews and Judaism in today's translations and interpretations of this chapter, and throughout the letter as well. In the chapters in this volume, Nanos shows why these translations and interpretive decisions, among others, do not likely represent what Paul wrote or meant. Each essay offers challenges to the received view of Paul from the research hypothesis that Paul and the Christ-followers to whom he wrote were still practicing Judaism (a Jewish way of life) within subgroups of the Jewish synagogue communities of Rome, and that they understood Paul to observe Torah and promote Judaism for their communities.

From 9/11 to Israel-Palestine to ISIS, the fear of the religious stranger is palpable. Conservative talk show hosts and liberal public intellectuals are united in blaming religion, usually Islam, for the world's instability. If religion is part of the problem, it can and should be part of the solution. Strangers, Neighbors, Friends--co-authored by a Muslim, a Christian, and a Jew--aims to inform and inspire Abraham's children that God calls us to extend our love beyond family and fellow believer to the stranger.

The dominant portrayals of the apostle Paul are of a figure who no longer valued Jewish identity and behavior, opposing them for both Jew and non-Jew in his assemblies. This prevailing version of Paul depends heavily upon certain interpretations of key'flashpoint'passages. In this book and the subsequent volumes in this series, Mark Nanos undertakes to test a'Paul within Judaism'(re)reading of the apostle, especially of these'flashpoint'texts. Nanos demonstrates how traditional conclusions about Paul and the meaning of his letters are dramatically altered by testing the hypothesis that the historical Paul practiced a Jewish, Torah-observant way of life, and that he expected those whom he addressed to know that he did so. Nanos also tests the hypothesis that the non-Jews addressed were expected to know that his guidance was based on promoting a Jewish way of life for themselves, at the same time insisting that they remain non-Jews and thus not technically under Torah on the same terms as himself and the other Jews in this new (Jewish) movement. In conversation with the prevailing views, Nanos argues that the'Paul within Judaism'perspective offers not only more historically probable interpretations of Paul's texts, but also more promise for better relations between Christians and Jews, because these texts have informed Christian concepts of, ways of talking about, and behavior toward Jews based on the premise that Paul considered Jews and Judaism the mirror opposites of what Christians should be and become.

While all have reason to celebrate the greening of Christian-Jewish relations since the Shoah and the promulgation of Nostra Aetate (4), few will deny that much work remains to be done by Christians and Jews seeking the best way forward that they might best serve God's purposes in the world, the mission of God. This book addresses that need by first surveying how each community has historically conceived of its own mission and from that stance assigned an identity to the other. The text illuminates how such construals have often impeded progress and therefore need to be upgraded and supplemented. But how shall this be done? Converging Destinies proposes an eschatological vision and practical suggestions to summon Jews and Christians to prepare for that day when each will be both commended and reproved by the judge of all, sounding a call for more determined action, greater humility, and cooperative effort as together Jews and Christians serve the mission of God, accountable to him for how they have served him and each other in the world that he has created according to his will.

Seventy years after it took place, the Holocaust committed against the Jews of Europe during World War II continues to cast a giant shadow over humankind. Man's inhumanity to man is not a thing of the past. Genocidal action is still commonplace around the globe. Has humankind learned the lessons of the past? Is the human race doomed to live in a perpetual state of war and self-destruction? Explaining the Holocaust shows how, given the right circumstances, human beings can lose their humanity. Does that mean that the ethical teachings of the major religions are wishful thinking? This book tackles two questions that continue to be asked by people everywhere: Why did a highly civilized nation like Germany, in the middle of the twentieth century, commit the most heinous crime in all of human history? And if indeed there is a loving God who made a covenant with the people of Israel, why were millions of innocent, peaceful Jews dehumanized, starved, tortured, and systematically murdered? Explaining the Holocaust spares no one in discussing the enormity of the evil. But it also shows how the divine spark in human beings did not die during those years of darkness, and why we still have a glimmer of hope.

These essays represent William Campbell's ongoing challenge over the last two decades to a residual aspect of the paradigm of Paulinism, namely that of interpreting Paul in antithesis to his Jewish roots. Campbell has proposed a new approach to Paul focusing on such themes as diversity, identity, and reconciliation as the basic components of transformation in Christ. The stance from which Paul theologizes is one that recognizes and underpins social and cultural diversity and includes the correlative demand that since difference is integral to the Christ-movement, the enmity associated with difference cannot be tolerated. Thus reconciliation emerges as a fundamental value in the Christ-movement. Such reconciliation respects and does not negate the particularities of the identity of Jews and those from the nations. This paradigm transformation implies the reevaluation of all things in Christ, whether of Jewish or Gentile origin. An underlying trajectory permeates these essays. What unites them is the emphasis on continuity between Judaism and the Christ-movement, particularly as exemplified in Paul's letter to the Romans. Such continuity is vitally important not only for understanding the past and present of Christ-followers, but even more significantly for the contemporary understanding of the identity of both Judaism and Christianity.

Israel's Messiah and the People of God presents a rich and diverse selection of essays by theologian Mark Kinzer, whose work constitutes a pioneering step in Messianic Jewish theology. Including several pieces never before published, this collection illuminates Kinzer's thought on topics such as Oral Torah, Jewish prayer, eschatology, soteriology, and Messianic Jewish-Catholic dialogue. This volume offers the reader numerous portals into the vision of Messianic Judaism offered in Kinzer's Postmissionary Messianic Judaism (2005). An introductory essay by editor Jennifer M. Rosner sets Kinzer's thought and writings in context.