Preface to the 2012 eBook Edition:
Quite a bit has transpired in the world and my own life since the publication of Messianic Jewish Congregations by University Press in 2000. As a 1997 dissertation, its research and writing represented a “waypoint” in my religious journey.
Raised in a Jewish home, I ended my teen years dabbling in eastern religious experiences encouraged by the 60s counterculture and fueled by psychedelic music and substances. With Vietnam as an ever-threatening storm ready to burst on any draft-eligible college student falling below 30 credit-hour per year threshold, I eventually found myself attracted to the philosophical and ethical teachings of the first century Jewish itinerant rabbi, Jesus of Nazareth. My interest in Jesus’ life and teachings eventually attracted me to the emerging sub-culture of “Jesus Freaks” in southern California. After a summer of religious exploration just before I started basic training at Great Lakes Naval Training Center north of Chicago, I began to see myself as a present-day Jewish follower of Jesus—just two millennia late!
I spent the next three decades trying to fit in with the gentile-Christian community. By 1994, I was beginning to suspect that there was just no way to reconcile my Jewish sensibilities and my attraction to the person of Jesus with any “Christian” institution or organization. It was at that time that I heard about the late-19th century Jewish-Christian Kishinev congregation in Eastern Europe (chapter three). As I began to research what seemed to be an isolated historical occurrence, I was made aware of the current-day proliferation of Jewish-Christian congregations in the United States and Israel.
The more research I did into this subject, the more encouraged and excited I became that this Messianic Jewish movement might be the spiritual home I sought for so long. However, after completing my research, and especially the interviews of chapters four and five, I began to find this “Jewish” form of Christianity to be virtually indistinguishable from the historic Evangelical movement that has risen to prominence in the last 150 years.
I had very little time to consider the implications of my own research. I finished the dissertation and all my requirements for my Ph.D. in World Religions in May 1997. Within a few months I had moved my family to the other side of the world to teach at the Singapore Baptist Seminary. After 18 months as a very unhappy employee of a Christian denomination, I brought my family home. I was “finished with Christianity!”
Thus, I now saw little prospect for a career teaching at any confessional institution. Neither did I countenance the continued prospect of striking out on my own, as I had done in forming Africa Harvest Ministries in Zimbabwe. I found shelter in a nearby Reform Jewish congregation. Feeling at-home for the first time in decades, I reveled in the freedom to think, believe, hope and interact that Jewish life allows. My wife found her spiritual home as well, converting to Judaism.
Now comfortably settled in Chicago, I sought secular teaching positions. When only part-time positions became available, I took regular full-time employment with a Fortune 100 company.
Nine years after relocating from Singapore to Chicago, circumstances allowed me to spend the majority of my time in the classroom—this time teaching at Chicago area community colleges. As I teach world religions courses to the post-9/11 generation of undergraduate students, I note a startling lack of familiarity with the basic elements of the type of personal religious quest that was so important to those of us who “survived” the 60s. In addition, there seems to be a real disconnect with the basic constituent elements of religious life in America. In the daily exchange of the classroom, it becomes obvious that this current generation of college students has little, if any knowledge of important concepts from their own faith backgrounds. They seem to know nothing at all about how all of this “works” in the life of a believer.
To remedy this, I began using this book to teach the historical elements of the emergence of Christianity as a new religion born out of 1st century Jewish life. The interviews in 4th and 5th chapters expose students to the “faith” thinking and problem-solving prevalent in the close of the 20th century.
To personalize this even more, I have students reading the blog, “Confessions of a Wandering Jew,” that I began writing in 2009. The blog chronicles my own spiritual journey. It details my personal quest from my university days in the late 60s to the 1978-87 exploits in southern Africa. Future blog installments will cover the interim of the 1997 publication of Messianic Jewish Congregations as my doctoral dissertation, my time in Singapore up to the present day in Chicago. I plan to publish the updated content of the blog separately in 2013.
In preparing this manuscript for publication in the iTunes Store, I have made a few minor corrections and format changes to make this work as an eBook. I used Apple Pages word processing and Calibre software to meet the publishing deadline for my August classes.
I hope to continue this conversation on my blog, especially from any of those who contributed to the original research or are intimately involved in the Messianic Jewish movement today. I continue to welcome your all comments, corrections and correspondence at the new e-mail address below.
Jeff Wasserman
Chicago, Illinois
July 2012
Email: jeffrey.s.wasserman@gmail.com
Blog: http://ConfessionsofaWanderingJew.blogspot.com
URL: www.ConfessionsofaWanderingJew.com
Preface to the 2000 Print Edition
In the two and a half years since the completion of my doctoral dissertation, “Messianic Jewish Congregations: A Comparison and Critique of Contemporary North American and Israeli Expressions,” not much has changed in the Messianic Jewish world. The recent publication of Facts & Myths: About the Messianic Congregations in Israel by Kai Kjær-Hansen and Bodil F. Skjøtt documents 69 congregations with 12 independent house groups.[1] In seeking to dispel the sensationalistic estimates of tens of thousands of Israeli Messianic Jews made by Israeli anti-missionary organizations and less inflated but unrealistic numbers quoted by Christian agencies, the authors miss the significance of the 81 congregations.
According to their estimates, in the 51 years from the re-establishment of the Jewish state, the number of congregations has increased from 2 to 81 and Jewish believers from less than 200 to 2178 adult core members in the congregations.[2] As researchers, they did not attempt to survey children or Messianic believers who are not core members of the congregations. Nevertheless, the significance is in the number of congregations. Although this number is not as dramatic as reports coming out of Africa, Asia, or Latin America from church planting agencies, it is significant for the number of corporate witnesses in a land and among a people believed to be strongly resistant to the person of Jesus.
Just after completing my dissertation, I left for a teaching assignment in Singapore. Having returned to the United States in recent months to teach World Religions in local undergraduate and graduate programs, I have felt an urgency to make the information from my dissertation available to the general public. I continue to research Messianic Judaism and plan to publish more in the future. My next project is a planned survey of Messianic Jewish views on evangelism and missions. My purpose in publishing this work in its current format is to make my initial research available to a wider spectrum of interested individuals who may not have access to scholarly sources.
I have made a few minor corrections, format changes, and removed some extraneous matter, but the rest stands as originally submitted to my doctoral committee. I welcome your comments, corrections, and correspondence at my e-mail address: jeffrey.s.wasserman@gmail.com.
Jeff Wasserman
Highland Park, Illinois
November 1999
Notes
[1] Kai Kjær-Hansen and Bodil F. Skjøtt, Facts & Myths: About the Messianic Congregations in Israel (Jerusalem: Caspari Center for Biblical and Jewish Studies, 1999), 17.
[2] Ibid., 70.
[3] Shoshanah Feher, Passing Over Easter: Constructing the Boundaries of Messianic Judaism (Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 1998).
[4] Carol Harris-Shapiro and Micah Kleit, ed., Messianic Judaism: A Rabbi’s Journey Through Religious Change in America (Boston: Beacon Press, 1999).
Acknowledgments
I want to recognize the special contributions of several individuals who played significant roles in the preparation of this monograph. Dr. James D. Chancellor has agonized through each permutation from prospectus to final draft, laboring to help me clarify my content and expression. Dr. W. Bryant Hicks has been my mentor, friend, and has served as surrogate grandfather for my daughter Abigail. Throughout my seminary experience, he continuously encouraged me that I was up to the challenge of doctoral work. Dr. Robert D. Hughes patiently read each chapter, supporting my hope that even a dissertation could be written in an interesting fashion. When I needed a break from the grind of research, I relaxed by reading one of his science fiction novels.
Dr. Kai Kjær-Hansen assisted me in developing research sources and furnished his suggestions and comments on the rough draft. David and Marsha Smith lodged and fed me during my time in Israel, taking time away from their own family to make sure that I was able to accomplish the goals of my research. And finally, I want to recognize my wife, Pegi, my support and inspiration for twenty-three years, and for the last thirteen years, mother of the most wonderful child in the world, Abigail.
Materials from the following are reproduced with permission:
“Contextualization: Witness and Reflection, Messianic Jews as a Case” by Stuart Dauermann and Fana Spielberg in Missiology: An International Review 25, no. 1 (January 1997).
Jewish Roots: A Foundation of Biblical Theology for Messianic Judaism by Dan Juster.
Joseph Rabinowitz and the Messianic Movement: The Herzl of Jewish Christianity by Kai Kjær-Hansen with permission from the author and from Handsel Press Ltd., Edinburgh, Scotland.
Lyrics to P’siat HaMashiach, Mi Ha’Ish, and Ma’amik HaChosekh by David and Lisa Loden.
Messianic Judaism: Its History, Theology, and Polity by David A. Rausch with permission from The Edwin Mellen Press, Lewiston, NY.
The History of Jewish Christianity: From the First to the Twentieth Century by Hugh G. Schonfield with permission from Manna Books, P.O. Box 113, Ashford, Kent, TN23 3NB, U.K.