Great, so we can clear out the heredity thing, which is good because it's a massive problem that is specifically refuted by the scriptures - "a mixed multitude" went out of Egypt. You weren't an Israelite at Sinai because of your parentage, you were because of faithfulness to the covenant. Israel was
made. Even later, a person could become an Israelite by following the Torah, culminating in circumcision and subsequently eating the Passover. At St Paul notes, "A man is not a Jew because he is one outwardly, nor is circumcision only outward and physical. No, a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter."
As for faithfully living by the Torah, I don't agree. For one, even in the days of Jesus the Samaritans had a different Torah than the Judaeans. By whatever means - either the words of scripture itself in the narrow sense, or in the broader sense of way of life, how they lived. Because if they followed the same way of life, they wouldn't be two people (Samaritan vs Jew) but one people, without distinction. The fact that the distinction exists shows they did not follow the same Torah. The Samaritans were the offspring of the remnants of the northern kingdom - destroyed for faithlessness, idolatry,
not following the Torah - and the people forcibly migrated there by the Assyrians. They worshipped in a different temple, on a different mountain. There is no way to force a compatibility here unless you create two Torahs, two people, and... what, two Gods? Doesn't St Paul point to the opposite when he says "
Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. Consider the people of Israel: are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar?" It is at least in part (if not almost entirely) the ritual life that binds and creates the body, the people.
Second, it is not possible for them to follow the Torah. The Torah is a way of life that is both moral teaching
and ritualistic. As above, if you cannot do the ritual, you cannot follow Torah. Like the Psalms say, "How can we sing a song of Yahweh in a foreign land?" The inability to practice the Torah is a cut directly at the identity of the people. No temple, no sacrifices, no Torah. Go read through Leviticus sometime and see just how much is impossible today. At best they are all ritually unclean, without a priesthood.
Third, at a deeper spiritual level it is impossible to follow the Torah and reject Jesus Christ. St Paul tells us that Christ Jesus is the culmination (
telos) of the Torah for those who believe or are faithful. The Torah points us, leads us to Christ. If you claim to follow the Torah and reject Christ, you have missed it
entirely. If you reject the heir, you place yourself outside the promises every bit as much as the Edomites or the tribes of the Northern Kingdom did - and you are cut off. So I categorically reject that people who have openly, willingly, knowingly, and unrepentantly rejected Chris Jesus - who is both the giver of the Torah and its end, who is in a mystical way the Torah itself ("I am the Way...") - can in any way be said to faithfully be living by the Torah. No.
Finally, the roots we gentiles are grafted into are not the roots of heredity, but the roots of faithfulness. This is St Paul's whole point, after noting that not all who are descended from Jacob are Israel, he talks about faithlessness resulting in branches being cut off of the faithful root. We are grafted into the the faithful remnant by faith. We are not grafted onto a faithless blood heredity by faith! St Paul says:
Quote:
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, "I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.
"unbelief" and "faithlessness" are the same word. St Paul says, do not be yoked with the faithless. What partnership does righteousness have with
anomia - literally non-Torah keeping. What portion can the faithful one share with the unfaithful? He reiterates what I have pointed out here, writing again to gentiles, that faithfulness and God make one part of God's people.
Modern Jews do not keep Torah. They are not faithful to the Master, the Torah-giver, the Judge, the mystical Torah itself. They are cut off because of unfaithfulness, they are not the faithful remnant. We are the people of God, in continuity; we practice the faith of the patriarchs and the prophets and the Apostles, who all worshipped Christ Jesus as the Word of God. And we should pray for their repentance so that, as St Paul says, they as natural branches can be grafted back into the tree of Jesse where they belong - by faithfulness to Christ Jesus.
