Judaism -

A Basis for Christian Unity

by Frederick M. Schweitzer, PH.D.

That Judaism is the common denominator of all hristian bodies is an idea stated most memorably by Karl Barth in Church Dogmatics, where he writes that the "Church must live with the Synagogue, not . . . [merely] as with another religion or denomination, but as with the root from which it has itself sprung." Barth once suggested that the most obvious facilitator of Christian reunion would be for the Christian churches to gain a profounder consciousness and enhanced knowledge of their Jewish origins. In this regard, as in many other areas, we Christians need the Jews and Judaism much more than they need us, because we have not succeeded, as St. Paul urged, in making the Jews "jealous" of us (Romans 11:14). So it is, as Barth put it, that the church "still owes everything to those to whom it is indebted for everything."1

Aspirations for the renewal of the Church depend, in large measure, on a return to the biblical sources and on an accurate understanding of the milieu in which primitive Christianity and the early Church took form. For some Christian denominations, the return is, or will be, easier than for others. Protestantism has generally represented a rigorous return to the biblical texts, but a return divorced from (Catholic) tradition. In Protestant biblical exegesis, this condition seems, however, to have had the effect of promoting the study of the Old Testament divorced from its (Jewish) tradition. A fundamental element in the Calvinist reform movement (as well as of Puritanism in England and North America) was an Hebraic revival. For today’s heirs of the Puritans, such a return to the biblical texts appears to be easy, almost natural. For others, their Jewish heritage is, if only psychologically, a bit more remote, having been buried under centuries of so-called "de-Judaizing." For all, however, and, inescapably, Judaism is their tap root. Indeed, if the Jewish elements were somehow subtracted from Christianity in any of its forms, only the merest fragments, a bit of "Hellenistic detritis," would remain.

Central to the beliefs of virtually all Christian bodies is the doctrine of the dual nature of Jesus Christ, God and man. Jesus’ divinity is paramount in all aspects of Christian life and thought, but rather little scope is usually given to his humanity. If that were not true, we would be far more aware that the human Jesus, the "historical Jesus," was a Jew. Although such historical facts constituted an "enigma" and "vexing problem" for the Church fathers,2 Jesus was born, lived, worshipped, and died a Jew. Clearly, Jesus had mastered the Torah, Prophets, Psalms, and Daniel, and, no doubt, more of the Hagiographa. Moreover, he was closely acquainted with methods of expounding scripture and the law, a knowledge which he had gained, not formally as a member of an academy, but from synagogue expositions in his native Galilee and from itinerant teachers.

Jesus’ ethical teachings are "entirely Jewish–even extremely so."3 Nearly every verse in the Sermon on the Mount, for example, can be matched by a saying from Jewish tradition. Pioneer scholar, R. Travers Herford, has noted acutely that the common ethical ground between Jesus and early rabbis is not to be explained by suggesting that either party borrowed from the other. Rather, both appropriated that common ethical ground from Jewish tradition and the synagogue. Some part of the ethics that passed over to Christianity derived directly from the Old Testament and is easily traced, while another body of ethical principles reported in the Gospels, though dating from a time before their composition, was remembered as being original to Jesus. It was "nothing" to Jesus’ followers that those principles had their source in the more remote past of Jewish tradition.4

The entire body of Jesus’ teachings is so steeped in the Jewish practice and belief of his day that we are justified in saying that his message is a midrash–an interpretation–on the Judaism of his time, indeed that the New Testament is a midrash on the Old Testament. Reading the Gospels is somewhat like reading T. S. Eliot–one asks oneself: where have I seen this before? That is, where in the Jewish Scripture does this come from? At nearly every turn of Jesus’ life, as it is reported to us, some text of the Old Testament is quoted, paraphrased, echoed, or assumed. The heresy of Marcion, that earliest of the "de-Judaizers," is really inconceivable; it would discard the Jewish Scripture, but that cannot be done, because as Karl Barth reminds us, without the Old Testament "the Church cannot live"; "there would never have been a New Testament or a Christian Church."5

The same analysis applies to that more amorphous entity, Jewish tradition. Scripture alone, apart from the milieu and community in which it rose, is like the libretto of an opera without the music. The various Christian churches spring essentially from conflicting interpretations of the New Testament. To elucidate the New Testament, we must place it in its Jewish matrix and see it as a book, largely, by, for, and about Jews. That means we must study it in the context of its Jewish milieu during the first century and the whole inter-testamental period. Really to know ourselves, we Christians must also learn Mishnah, Midrash, and Talmud. Fundamental to our understanding of Jesus are the titles bestowed on him, such as "the Son of Man," for example. We Christians are thus required to master–both as understood then as a technical requirement–a long series of biblical and inter-testamental terms and concepts that were current in the first century, such as "the kingdom of Heaven" which is at hand and the "New Covenant" which renews rather than cancels the original covenant. Explanation of such titles, of relationship between churches and synagogues, and of other similar matters will surely have far-reaching significance for the perception of Christian doctrine, sacraments, liturgy and ecclesiastical organization. It will also enable Christians to "discover their oneness at the root."6 The Dead Sea Scrolls are a graphic revelation of the degree to which Christian belief and practice were foreshadowed in Jewish tradition; such prefigurations are quite unlikely to be confined to Qumran. Seeing the New Testament in the stream of Jewish tradition may enable Christians to achieve a balance between Kerygma and History, Gospel and Law, Aggadah and Halachah, and thus do something to heal the schisms that divide them. History can sometimes redress the balance of theology.

Schism is a recurring phenomenon in religious history. We need mention only the Reformation of the sixteenth century, the Great Schism of 1059, and especially the "Proto-schism" between Christianity and Judaism which is a dominant motif in Christian scripture. In our ecumenical concerns, we Christians can appropriately go back further and read in I Kings about the schism between Israel and Judah, pondering it in the light of St. Paul’s assertion (I Cor. 10) that "all things happened to them (the Israelites) as a type and were written for our correction."7 Variety rather than schism has been the spice of Jewish religious life during the common era (the Karites are the one exception to that rule). In the first century, Jews were divided (but not schismatically, and apparently with much overlapping) among Zealots, Sadducees, Pharisees, and Essenes, with the Qumran sect blurring the lines even more. Today, there is (to put it simplistically) a tripartite division among Orthodox, Reform, and Conservative Jews, all of whom validate themselves by reference to ancient Judaism (just as we Christians do), but they have never lacked a sense of "ecumenical camaraderie" (if I may call it such) in their dealings with one another. A paradigm for Christians to meditate upon?

In recent years, liturgical scholars have achieved a genuine ecumenical break-through, one marvelously described by Dom Gregory Dix, who was fond of saying: "Our understanding of our forms of worship underwent a radical transformation (since about 1910) when it finally occurred to someone that Jesus was a Jew."8 Although Jesus attacked Pharisees (but was one of them) and the Temple (yet paid the half shekel Temple tax), Jesus never criticized the synagogue, for it was there he prayed, learned, preached, and taught–"as usual" (Luke 4:16-17).

We Christians have come a long way from our former perverse habit of seeking the origins of the Eucharist in pagan rites and mystery cults! This is not the ecumenical point, however. Rather, it is that conceptions of the Eucharist and of the sacraments in general vary greatly among Christians. We can, perhaps, overcome many such differences or at least tolerate them more freely when once we have traced them back to their starting-point. "It is astonishing how clear and easily understandable everything becomes," Louis Bouyer urges, "when we at least take the trouble to re-establish" the context in which the Eucharist originated and developed.10 Perhaps "the sterile and unending controversies" among Christian theologians will never be entirely resolved, but at least we shall not be chided as we are by Schalom Ben-Chorim: "When at the passah meal I lift the unleavened bread, I am doing what he [Jesus of Nazareth] did, and I know that I am much closer to him than many Christians who celebrate the Eucharist in complete separation from its Jewish origins."11

Ecumenism does not hold out the possibility that a single formal organization will eventually incorporate all Christian denominations in a monolithic entity. Rather, the wonderful prospect is that we Christians shall overturn the barriers of hostility, fear, and indifference that have stood in the way of encountering one another in knowledge, empathy and hope. In such an endeavor, the repossession of our Jewish heritage is our greatest asset. Again, it is Karl Barth who impels us in the right direction. First, he does so by eloquently recalling to our minds that "the Gentile Christian community of every age and land is a guest in the house of Israel," and "what the history of the Jews tells us is that the divine election is the election of another. Our election can be only in and with this other." Second, Barth leads us in sorting out our ecumenical agenda. Having noted that there are "many good contacts drawing Christians closer," and that ecumenism "is driven by the Spirit of the Lord," Barth would also not let us forget that "there is only one really important question: our relations with Israel." He insists that ecumenism "suffers more seriously from the absence of Israel than of Rome or Moscow."12

12 Barth, op. cit., III: 3, p. 225; IV: 3, pp. 877-878; quoted in Helga Croner, comp., Stepping Stones. . . , p. 5.

–Reprinted with permission of Ecumenical Trends magazine.

Dr. Fredereick Schweitzer is professor of history at Manhattan College in Bronx, New York. He is an articulate exponent of ecumenism who teaches that re-establishing the Jewish foundations of Christian faith is a distinct means of advancing the cause of unity in the international body of Messiah.