Who are Messianic Jews?
Judaism in Five Minutes - Sarah Imhoff
Yaakov Ariel [+]
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Yaakov Ariel is Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Description
This chapter traces the development of Messianic Judaism, a movement of Jews who had embraced Protestant Christianity and wished to maintain some Jewish customs and rites. Originating at the turn of the twentieth century and gaining more prominence in the 1970s, Messianic Jews promote some Jewish cultural attributes and rituals at the same time that they embrace the theology and morality associated with evangelical Christianity. While struggling to be accepted as both genuinely Jewish and Christian, Messianic Jews built their own subculture, complete with national organizations, youth movements, conferences, retreats, prayer books, hymnals, publications and periodicals, including theological, apologetic, and evangelistic treatises.