Yeah, you scored the touchdown...but are you up for the conversion????

Checking my Facebook this morning, I came across a post that Derek Leman made regarding "reasons not to convert".  Having read the objections that some individuals have with making conversion normative, I am still in the dark as to the reasons these folks have objections to a sound, well researched, well prayed about, well thought through, legitimate avenue for conversion. For those people who truly have a desire, the motivation, the "neshama" in them , it would seem the only real choice for them is taking that final step into Judaism.(and yes, I do think the concept of neshama is viable in light of faith in Messiah)

"Normative" Judaism certainly in the distant past considered conversion "normative", at least for those who were prepared to make that level of commitment to the G-d of Israel, the People of Israel.


The words of Yeshua regarding Pharisees who "travel the world to make a convert" speaks of a time when proselytizing was certainly in keeping with what is "normative".Certainly it was normative for what at the time one of the more popular streams of Judaism being practices in the ANE.

After the destruction of the Second Temple, as we make our way into the middle ages, it would certainly seem that there were valid reasons for discouraging converts, not the least of which was the shear persecution of Jews which has continued unabated for the better part of the last two millenia.

Of more recent history, one need only look to individuals like Rabbi Johnathan Ginsberg in Illinois or Rabbi Celso Cukierkorn in Florida as two "normative" Jews who are certainly making an effort for chiruv on a fairly big scale. Recognizing that this isn't the full spectrum of Judaism, it certainly seems that although very careful and circumspect assessment of potential converts is the rule for conversion ,the idea of conversion is at the very least an "accepted" part of "normative Judaism".

Of course conversion isn't for everyone, that goes without saying.Derek points out several good reasons in his post.

However,If it is Jewish believers who have concerns over this seemingly broad sweeping fear of conversion becoming "normative", my question is, well what is normative Judaism? Or rather, what is the example of normative Judaism?

To continue this idea and understanding of making conversion within Messianic Judaism "the exception" to the exception to the rule, as opposed to speaking about it in a more tolerant tone, will continue to point gentile Messianics who do have that inner neshama, that true understanding of Yiddishkeit, that true desire to have not just a passing association with the Torah or the People of the Holy One of Israel (May he be blessed forever and ever) elsewhere.... Leman himself points out that the alternative is the mainstream forms of conversion which carry with them either an implicit or an explicit denial of Messiah.


I may be preaching to the choir, in responding to Derek in this manner, as he himself has just gone through the conversion process through the MJRC. I for one have gone down the path of "following the Torah my own way" , in a non Jewish way. For me, I found it very disingenuous, and it became less and less satisfying to me. Similarly, I have also tried to follow those other aspects of observance within a Jewish context. Again, ultimately I am not a Jew, and cannot feel completely comfortable in observing those aspects and components of Torah outside of that reality.  For me, that is an unacceptable end point.

As one individual very seriously and soberly contemplating conversion, I want this to be not Torah my way, but Torah in the context of Klal Yisroel. My stand is that I would be blessed with the challenges associated with the responsibility of the Torah in all its fullness, to inextricably bind myself to Am Yisroel.
It has been so easy as a gentile coming to this movement to pepper one's conversations with Heblish or Yinglish.(again , please reread my note :) ) To talk about decidedly Jewish subjects with no sense of Yiddishkeit or of the inherent "Jewishness" of the subject matter. to take on things like lighting candles Friday night, Havdalah on Saturday night, Shmonei Esrei, ______(fill in the blanks) without that connection to Greater Judaism. Again the one half of the coin is that these are areas that need to be pared away from the lives of Gentile believers, that the things are "Jewish" elements which are set aside for Judaism.

The other side of that coin though is the heart of those who have practised those things, who have seen Torah, have tasted and seen the deeper level of community in the torah and in its binding together of the greter Jewish community. Who have that  heart for Israel.

Certainly I need to clarify that phrase. "Heart for Israel" is something which has been misappropriated and co-opted over a very long period of time.  At it most benign it has been used to describe Christians who have a desire to see the fulfilment of ceertain dispensational interpretations of Scripture.  This is one end of a long continuum  describing everything from simply mixed up theology to profoundly questionable and outright anti-Semitic practice.  As an example, adherents to the British Israel movement claimed to have  a "heart" for Israel.

The heart of Israel I speak about is the heart that beats in sync with Am Yisroel. A heart which is overjoyed at Jewish achievement, that weeps  weeps over Jewish loss. A heart that exults in seeing Hashem's first love triumph in righteousness, proclaiming through the keeping of His Torah that He indeed is G-d. A heart which cries out with indignation at slights against His people........A heart which longs to be in community and relationship with the people of Jacob.
 
That is my heart.  B"H, it will come to pass in His way and time.