Although David Klinghoffer rejects Jesus as Messiah, he is convinced that the Jewish rejection of Jesus is the ultimate reason for Christianity's worldwide appeal. "Had the Jews embraced Jesus... in every key respect, the Jesus movement might have remained a Jewish sect" (7).

Klinghoffer helps us "understand how he [Jesus] would have appeared as a Jew to his listeners" (23). By doing so, he demonstrates how difficult it would be for Jesus' Jewish contemporaries to embrace him as Messiah. "[A]ny proposed messiah, to win popular approval, had to be measured against Judaism's biblical heritage" (23). Cast in light of popular Jewish expectation, Jesus failed to gather in the Jewish exiles, visibly reign as messianic king over the nations, and establish a new covenant based on a restored commitment to the observance of Torah. Messianic pretenders were commonplace in Jesus' day. People would not instantly accept just anyone who claimed messianic credentials. Jesus' unique interpretation of Torah (which could easily appear to be indifference to Torah) and his rejection of violence against Rome as a means to Jewish liberation made him, at the very least, suspect in the eyes of faithful Jews.

To Klinghoffer, Jesus is neither an ethical teacher nor an apocalyptic seer. Instead, he is "a most complicated person" (42). His view of Paul is far more negative. He believes that Paul was either a bad Jew or perhaps not even Jewish at all. He argues that Paul could not read Hebrew (because he quotes from the Septuagint) and lied about his connections to the Jewish super-rabbi, Gamaliel. "His letters are not logical, syllogistic, or even coherent much of the time. They are ecstatic and poetic" (104). Whether truly Jewish or merely a poser, Paul was a traitor to Judaism. "They [the Jews] regarded him as a faker who didn't understand the faith he so passionately critiqued. And they were right" (115).

Klinghoffer's book exposes something that Christians often take for granted. We assume that it is obvious that the Old Testament (or better, Hebrew Bible) should point faithful readers in the direction of Jesus. But this is not as obvious as we assume. Many of the Christian proofs of Jesus' messiahship from Hebrew prophecy focus mostly on his death and resurrection, something that would have no relevance for Jesus' contemporaries during Jesus' earthly ministry. How could they be expected to know Jesus was Messiah based on the weight of Hebrew prophecy if the bulk of these prophecies would not be fulfilled until Jesus' death and resurrection?

Christians believe the Hebrew Bible points to Jesus because we begin at the end: "the fact is that Paul began with the assumption that salvation can be found only through faith in Christ and reasoned from there" (109). Klinghoffers' analysis demonstrates the significance of starting points in theological development. Much depends upon where one begins. If one begins with the assumptions of the New Testament and reads the Old in this light, one is more likely to see the preparation and promises of God fulfilled in Jesus.

But this is not the case for those who begin with the Old Testament and then look to the New. "For a Jew, it is the New Testament that must prove its compatibility with the Hebrew Bible" (215). From this perspective, it is not so obvious that Jesus is the fulfillment of Jewish expectations. According to Klinghoffer, this is the main reason for the Jewish rejection of Jesus: "the criteria for identifying the Messiah were so clearly spelled out in Jewish tradition, and the fulfillment of these criteria would be so obvious, that only a denier of the whole tradition could fail to recognize him when he comes" (159-160). As a representative of this position, Joseph Kimchi, a twelfth-century Provencal sage wrote: "You claim that Jesus saved the world from the day he came, but he accomplished nothing which can actually be seen" (161). If God wanted the Jews to see Jesus as their Messiah, "then He would have made it much clearer, far less open to doubt" (210).

Klinghoffer's book is helpful in demonstrating that belief in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah would not have been immediately obvious to his contemporaries. It also highlights how important one's hermeneutic of sacred scripture is: Christian interpretation reads the entire Bible in light of Jesus and sees him everywhere (I know I do), but this is not so easy for Jewish readers steeped in only their Hebrew Bible.

At the heart of Jewish/Christian difference is the simple question: Is Christ the interpretative key to the Hebrew Bible? For Christians, the answer is yes. For Jews, no. This essential difference should demonstrate how vital it is for Christians to constantly seek to interpret all Scripture - New Testament, but especially the Old - in light of its relationship to Christ. This is the only way to remain thoroughly and completely "evangelistic" in one's approach to biblical revelation. Too much that passes as Christian teaching is completely detached from this approach, leaving us with warmed-over legalism or christless principles that conflict with New Testament emphases.

Finally, Klinghoffer's book presents a curious thesis that indicates that the Jewish rejection of Jesus may have brought more good to the world than bad, once again underscoring God's strange ways of working (and sounding a lot like Romans 11 in the process). Perhaps, in contrast to Kimchi's statement that Jesus accomplished nothing that can actually be seen, Klinghoffer has alighted upon the truth that Jesus has accomplished (and continues to accomplish) God's will for the world, but he is doing it in the most subversive way possible.

© Richard J. Vincent, 2005