Thank you for allowing a short break in the action of responding to Asher Norman’s Twenty-Six Reasons Why Jews Don’t Believe in Jesus. I hope you were both inspired to do and reminded about the urgency of Jewish evangelism. Now on to Rebuttal #5 …
Norman makes a critical mistake of beginning hermeneutics. He fails to look at context, he fails to discover background, and he fails to view the entire panorama of Scripture as a collective whole and not simply individual parts.
Norman again confuses the meaning of “fulfilled” and perhaps does it suit his own purposes (for a clear Biblical Greek explanation of fulfilled see Rebuttal #4 to Reason #4). By confusing the issue and the Greek denotative language, the 26 Reasons author is successful at deflecting the issue at hand — the reality of the Messiahship of Jesus!
In Reason #5, Norman does this by attempting to play Pauline theology against the teachings of Jesus. He is not the first to try this, will not be the last, but his efforts are to recognized for what they are … specious argumentation.
First, the writer attempts to deny that Jesus claimed to be Messiah through the use of one verse — Matthew 19:16-17. What Jesus was attempting to do was to create a rhetorical argument with the rich young ruler to state that no one is God but God and that Jesus himself is good. Look at the context — the young man approaches Jesus about what to do to achieve eternal life and Jesus’ ultimate answer to him was to “follow me” (verse 21). If this is not a clear assessment of Jesus’ understanding of Himself, I don’t know what else could it be. In addition, John 8:58; 10:30-31; 14:6 seem to indicate that not only did Jesus know who He was but also the Jewish people also knew what He was saying.
Second, and do not read me wrong on this issue, I was bemused by Norman’s “kosher” arguments. There is nothing wrong with being Kosher but to argue that it is a condition for the elevation of the soul becomes awkward when one realizes that Abraham was not always kosher himself (Genesis 18:8).
Finally, the writer of 26 Reasons claims that Jesus was contradicting Torah based upon his views of divorce (Matthew 19). First, Norman ignores the fact that Jesus was responding as a rabbi to a rabbinical question. Second, the people were attempting to get a response based upon the debate between Shammai and Hillel. Third, Jesus’ response was not only a common one but also an expected one and one that continues to this day in the Talmud itself. Issues are debated between rabbis and evaluations are given as to what is the true and ultimate meaning of the Torah … and this is what Jesus did! And His answer was correct since after all He is the Messiah, the fulfillment of Torah, and God himself.
For good mr. Norman to argue that Kosher is a condition for the elevation of the soul becomes awkward sould seem to make one think that just keeping Kosher law is good enough or that salvation/prefection/holiness isobatained via keeping the law. Yeah, seems to be problematic.