Jews For Jesus Founder Dies At 78

By Fernando Alfonso III
Religion News Service

(RNS) Moishe Rosen, a controversial Baptist minister, writer and founder of the group Jews for Jesus, died in San Francisco Wednesday (May 19) at the age of 78. He had prostate cancer.

Rosen was born in Kansas City, Mo., to a family of Orthodox Jews. At the age of 21, Rosen met his wife Ceil and they both converted to Christianity.

Rosen founded Jews for Jesus in 1973 as an organization to "make the messiahship of Jesus an unavoidable issue to our Jewish people worldwide," as stated on the group's website.

"Therefore, I would urge you to think very seriously before you support any 'ministry' that involves Jewish people and doesn't actually bring the gospel to the Jews," Rosen said in a letter posted on the group's website after his death. "I hope I can count on you to show love and respect for the Jewish people, but Jewishness never saved anybody."

These sorts of statements typified Rosen's 23-year tenure as director of Jews for Jesus and made him a controversial figure for many Jews.

"Moishe Rosen was the founder of a problematic organization that aggressively and deceptively targeted Jews ... that disrespects thousands of years of Jewish belief," said Rabbi Eric Greenberg, director of Interfaith Affairs for the Anti-Defamation League. "He created problems for both the Jewish and Christian communities by willfully confusing religious identities and misrepresenting the sacred symbols of both faiths."

Some of the ways the group evangelizes included pamphlets entitled "On the First Day of Christmas My Rabbi Gave to Me ..." and "Jesus Made Me Kosher," the Washington Post said in its obituary.

Rosen and the group have been involved in at least seven lawsuits since 1987 over the distribution of pamphlets, freedom of speech, trademark infringement and Israeli citizenship.

He is survived by his wife and two daughters.

Comments

[JoshuaKaufman]

07:52 PM on 05/27/2010

I think that being open is the super key issue here, but at the same time, I think of Martin Lufer, and he split from the Mores to create a new religion. Sometimes I border on thinking that what he does is sacriligious but then sometimes I think that the complicatedness of Jesws for Jesus enriches our life. Sometimes I think I am agnostic, but my moma insists I remain a devout Jewish.

[Prousa]

05:38 PM on 05/24/2010

...and boy was he in for a big surprise.

[Alien Nation]

09:37 AM on 05/24/2010

Wow - I thought this was something made up on Moral Oral.

[PNOGUY]

10:18 PM on 05/23/2010

The early Christians were Jews who went around the known world converting Jews and Gentiles to a faith that was still very much Jewish in origin.

Moishe Rosen was a Jew who did basically the same thing. Christianity has spread for 2000 years by means of conversions, whether from Judaism, paganism, or any other -ism. It amuses me that contemporary people act as though religious "prosolytizing" is some new, horrid thing invented by 20th century Christians. It's been a part of virtually every religion since time immemorial. And Jews who have a problem with it should read the Scriptures again to see how their ancestors converted the people around them in ancient times.

[Trollstein]

02:13 PM on 05/23/2010

To understand the origins of the Jesus religion, one MUST appreciate the political and religious realities on the ground, in (and around) year zero. Very FEW people do. Jews (including the core establishment and the various fringe elements, of which Jesus' ministry was one of eleven significant groups) were all united by their resentment of Rome. The Jewish upper echelon in Jerusalem were puppets of Rome, as was the case everywhere else Rome ruled. The remaining 95+% of Jews lived in fear and loathing. The Roman governor Pontius Pilate was a ruthless savage. Roman law was also savage.
Jews lived rather comfortably between 1350-BCE and 600-BCE. After a series of occupations of Judah, hell hath arrived when Rome required able bodied Hebrew boys to join their army and go to other colonial sites around the globe and put the sword to any local refusnicks.
My point is . . One can be Jewish and advocate for Jesus, just not (logically) the rendition of Jesus which Mr. Rosen ascribed to. The authentic Jewish version of the Jesus Messiah was that he was 100% human and was a biblically qualified king, in the tradition of Moses and other established Hebrew prophets. The miracles were supposed to begin upon his return, which the Jewish Christians understood would be a full return from the grave and continued (renewed and strengthened) day to day leadership. The "Kingdom of God" was not supposed to last 15-minutes. Kosher and circumcision rules were to reman unchanged.

[holyheretic]

06:59 PM on 05/23/2010

@Trollstein .

Much of the Hebrew Bible narrates what it claims to be the history of Israel. However, a close reading of the biblical text in junction with other literary and archaeological evidence indicates that the "history" provided by the Hebrew Bible is frequently inaccurate or untrue.
Marc Zvi Brettler explores ways of reading the biblical texts if they are not read as history. Through in-depth analysis of texts from the Book of Chronicles, Genesis, Deuteronomy, Judges and Samuel, Brettler shows how the biblical historians were influenced by four key factors: typology, interpretation of earlier texts, satire and ideology. The Creation of History in Ancient Israel demonstrates how the historian can start to piece together the history of ancient Israel using the Hebrew Bible as a source.

The Creation of History in Ancient Israel By Marc Z Brettler
Publisher: Routledge 1998 | 272 Pages | ISBN: 0415194075

http://www.amazon.com/Creation-History-Ancient-Israel/dp/0415194075

[me again]

07:33 AM on 05/23/2010

Another example of a sad individual who devotes their life to a rumour.

[DevonTexas]

12:49 PM on 05/23/2010

well said.

[PNOGUY]

10:12 PM on 05/23/2010

Denying this historicity of Christ is just plain silly.

[holyheretic]

04:56 AM on 05/24/2010

@PNOGUY.

How about denying the divinity of Christ or worse, Muhammad?

[Alien Nation]

09:38 AM on 05/24/2010

Believing in people that have no record of living other than the one book written about them is just plain silly.

It's like believing Gandolf and middle earth existed because you read it in Lord of the Rings.

[riff4u]

01:02 AM on 05/23/2010

The whole Evangelical philosophy revolves around the idea that Jesus cannot return until all the Jews return to Palestine.........then Jesus comes back kills all the Jews (and Muslims) unless of course they become evangelicals. Well my son's orthodontist is a Jew who will never even visit Israel much less move there.........I guess Jesus cannot return.

[holyheretic]

02:34 AM on 05/23/2010

There is a similar sacred stupidity that is very popular among fervently religious Jews.

You ask them how come the messiah did not arrive after thousands of years. They reply that reason the messiah did not arrive yet is that all Jews must don tefillin and observe the Sabbath.

I always ask them: "what am I suppose to do? my own brother says he does not want the messiah to come - he promised to keep sinking the boat by not observing the holy day".

They always seem baffled, vanquished. They become speechless.

[DevonTexas]

12:50 PM on 05/23/2010

LOL

[holyheretic]

02:35 AM on 05/23/2010

Shneur Zalman had prophesied that the "Sabbath of the world" would come in the seventh millennium according to the traditional Hebrew calendar (he lived in the middle of the sixth). No wonder that his seventh-generation descendant, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, who lived and died as the seventh millennium was approaching, was so intoxicated with the expectation that the Messiah was poised to appear. Schneerson, who died in 1994, had hoped that his generation could be made worthy of the coming of the Messiah, and his Hasidim keep asking: Is there a more worthy candidate for Messiah than our sainted rebbe?

Many continue to believe that Schneerson, who selected no heir, will rise from the dead as the Redeemer of Israel. Until that day arrives, they will continue to scour the world for Jews who have strayed from their religion, asking men to don tefillin and women to light Shabbos candles. For the Lubavitcher Hasidim, this is the shortest path to messianic deliverance.
http://reformjudaismmag.net/599ah.html

[blackjack12]

02:46 AM on 05/23/2010

holy are you unhappy

[holyheretic]

09:24 PM on 05/22/2010

Peter Beinart's article is a "must read".

MY BLASPHEMOUS BLOGS
ניפוץ אלילים - ביעור הבערות
Holy Heretics - Jesus, Maimonides, Spinoza, the Founding Fathers, Herzl, Einstein.
http://holyheretics.com/

Holocaust Haggadah - שואה
Delusion dealers blame the victims.
Rabbi Irwin Kula: "Your Holocaust Haggadah is amazing."
http://holocausthagaddah.blogspot.com/

[holyheretic]

09:47 PM on 05/22/2010

I posted this comment here by error.

It belongs here: Will This Generation Of American Jews Abandon Israel? (New York Review)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/22/will-this-generation-of-a_n_586059.html

And Peter Beinart's article is here:
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/jun/10/failure-american-jewish-establishment/

[holyghostie]

08:19 PM on 05/22/2010

Christianity sprang from Judaism, and for decades the leadership looked to Judaism for answers on faith. But like all small and growing organizations, a decision needed to be made. Do we stay small and predominately Jewish. Or do we spread the message of Jesus to the gentiles too.

The Jews for Jesus are looking for the same thing those 1st century Jews were looking for.

[Erdgeist]

01:02 PM on 05/23/2010

Actually early Christianity never left Judaism. There was no difference between a Jew and a Christian when into came to Jewish law or Halakha. The problem came with the Gentile Cornelius, a Roman Centurion, who became a Jew but who was uncircumcised. Christians can argue about this 'till the cows come home, but the good evidence is on the side of those who say Christians should follow Jewish law like any other good Jew.

[Skenderbeg025]

07:13 PM on 05/22/2010

Dr Micheal Brown discovered Jesus was the Jewish Messiah, and it changed his life. Called to defend his new faith, Brown went on to master Hebrew, earning his Ph.D. in Semitic languages. In the past decades he has established himself as a leading Jewish Christian apologist.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulfYO7V4v60

[holyheretic]

11:08 PM on 05/22/2010

@Skenderbeg025.

Jews certainly knew Jesus best.

That is why they have always rejected the fraudulent claims about his divinity.

[Skenderbeg025]

10:06 AM on 05/23/2010

Sorry to burst your bubble but Jews are not always' the smartest people.
some of the best learned Jews who study the torah and Judaism all there life's
and yet follow some rabbi from Brooklyn as their savior
and Messiah, until he died and still they were waiting for him to rise
from the dead, and these people are in the 21 century...

Jews have been following false Messiahs for centuries and they all keep failing
Only Jesus is still followed by believers 2000 years later..

Every other Jewish Rabbi who claimed to be the Messiah never lasted.
because there is none but Jesus, like it or not.

Jewish Messiah claimants

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Messiah_claimants

[Naturechaplain]

05:30 PM on 05/22/2010

When I was an evangelical Christian I thought everyone should believe like I did. It was so sad that so many people I knew, including my Jewish girlfriend, would not be going to heaven with me and Jesus. Well, the Me and Jesus days are long gone now. Thank Goodness. I now have a good life after faith where Reason, diversity and healthy community are central. Now it seems sad that people are still stuck on the My Religion is Right train, dividing up the world into the Chosen and the Damned. I sure don't see the very un-Christian Jesus ever hopping aboard that train.

[holyheretic]

05:40 PM on 05/22/2010

Dear Naturechaplain.

Hallelujah!

And fanned!

[Skenderbeg025]

10:06 AM on 05/23/2010

Yeah Im sure you were.

[Matt Snider]

03:59 PM on 05/22/2010

This is a sad day for the J4J community. I met Moishe in 1976 and had the good fortune to meet multiple times with him over the intervening years. Though I did not always agree with him theologically, you could do worse than have a friend like Moishe. He was intelligent, witty, thoughtful, kind, considerate, honest, and generous. He would have given anyone the shirt off his back if they needed it. He certainly embraced the controversy that followed him but he saw that as just another way to advance his faith, of which he was absolutely convinced. Rest peacefully, my friend. From my point of view, you've earned it because you've left the world better for your presence here. You've fulfilled the commandment: "tikkun olahm." From your point of view, someone else earned your reward for you. Either way, may you enjoy it. I'll miss you.

[Skenderbeg025]

12:49 PM on 05/22/2010

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2q_3sktQBY&feature=related

Israeli family and their belief in Jesus and what they face in Israel as Jewish believers
but sooner or later Israelis will have to treat them as equal citizens and stop the
racism and discrimination against them as their numbers will certainly grow.

I hear Jews are tolerant maybe here in the US but not many in Israel are.

This family of Jewish believers in Jews seem like really great people and nice family.

As she said she was inusulted she was kicked out of the Isreal Army just because shes a believer, and points out her father and all her uncles serve in the IDF.
but not the Isrealis have changed thier minds....

[maxben]

03:46 PM on 05/22/2010

"Israeli family and their belief in Jesus and what they face in Israel as Jewish believers"

Obviously they aren't Jews then. Why confuse things more than they actually are? Can I see "Muslim believers in Jesus"? Of course not!

[Skenderbeg025]

07:22 PM on 05/22/2010

They are more Jewish then their crticis, and two why discrimate based on what they choose to believe ? They are Isreali born their familes fight for the IDF...
What happened to the Jews who love preaching freedom in this country but are quick to support hate and opperssion based on someones religion, if its different from theirs.


You ask can you see Muslims believe in Jesus? well Muslims already believe that Jesus was the Messiah and believe in his Virgin Birth and they also believe that Jesus will return again, so yeah Muslims can believe in Jesus..

[Saidso]

10:51 AM on 05/22/2010

www.iriseabove.com/apparition.html

[KIVPossum]

03:55 AM on 05/22/2010

Once I asked a dear friend of mine, who happens to be Jewish, what he thought of Jews for Jesus. His comment was, 'They're Christians'. Sums it up.

[holyheretic]

04:33 AM on 05/22/2010

@KIVPossum. "His comment was, 'They're Christians'".

I agree. I grew up as an orthodox Jew in the holy land. The view of Jewish people, religious or secular is that "Jews for Jesus" are not Jewish - and worse. See Opposition and criticism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews_for_Jesus

From Wikipedia
The identification of Jews for Jesus as a Jewish organization is overwhelmingly rejected by Jewish religious denominations[5][6] and secular Jewish groups[7][8] due to the Christian beliefs of its members.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews_for_Jesus

[bklynsparrow]

12:42 PM on 05/23/2010

Wow- you could have knocked me over with a feather- all the posts I read of your, I actually thought you were some ex-Christian atheist. I assumed- and all that implies. *deeply blushing* :-)

[Skenderbeg025]

11:54 AM on 05/22/2010

By Christian one means they believe in the Messiah named Jesus who himself was Jewish

So, I'll never understand how a Jew believing in another Jew makes
him/her "no longer Jewish"?

I think its nothing more the Jewish bigotry against other Jews for believing in Jesus, Jews have followed other Jews as the Messiah and they were never accused of nothing being Jews, its only when it comes to Jesus that some Jews throw out all common sense and deny you could believe in Jesus as the Messiah and still be Jewish.

being Jewish is more then a religion to must Jews, their are atheist Jews, Buddhist jews, and are still Jews but somehow believing in Jesus they not, making no sense.

its more to do with hate then fact, Jews are still Jews no matter what they believe.

[TheFriendlyAtheist]

12:49 PM on 05/22/2010

Good points Skenderbeg. It is rather absurd that an atheist such as Einstien, who did not believe in God or the Torah or the theological teachings of the Jewish religion, can be embraced by the Jewish community as being Jewish but that a Jew who believes that Jesus was the messiah cannot. But then, Jews for Jesus goes beyond accepting Jesus as the messiah and accepts all the other teachings of Christianity as well. This means believing that Jesus is one person in a three-person Godhead that somehow still makes up only one God (makes no sense whatsoever) and that he was at the same time both completely human and completely God (which makes even less sense).

[bklynsparrow]

12:36 PM on 05/23/2010

I would say you know very little about Judaism or Christianity for that matter. Circular reasoning based on a flase initial assumption is still incorrect no matter how many times you go around in circles.