Editing Messianic Judaism (section)

===Among Jews===
{{See also|Judaism's view of Jesus}}
As in traditional Jewish objections to Christian theology, opponents of Messianic Judaism hold that Christian proof texts, such as prophecies in the Hebrew Bible purported to refer the Messiah's suffering and death, have been taken out of context and misinterpreted.{{sfn|Cohn-Sherbok|2000|p=183}} Jewish theology rejects the idea that the Messiah, or any human being, is a [[divinity]]. Belief in the [[Trinity]] is considered idolatrous by most rabbinic authorities. Even if considered {{transliteration|he|[[shituf]]}} (literally, "partnership")—an association of other individuals with the God of Israel—this is only permitted for gentiles, and that only according to some rabbinic opinions. It is universally considered idolatrous for Jews.<ref name="OhrSomayach"/><ref name = "Shochet1999" />{{sfn|Berger|2003|ps=: "Some asserted that the association (shittuf) of Jesus with this God is permissible for non-Jews. Virtually none regarded such association as anything other than avodah zarah if the worshipper was a Jew."}} Further, Judaism does not view the role of the Messiah to be the salvation of the world from its sins, an integral teaching of Christianity{{sfn|Grudem|1994|pp=568–570}} and Messianic Judaism.<ref name="UMJC_StatementOfFaith"/>

Jewish opponents of Messianic Judaism often focus their criticism on the movement's radical ideological separation from traditional Jewish beliefs, stating that the acceptance of Jesus as Messiah creates an insuperable divide between the traditional messianic expectations of Judaism, and Christianity's theological claims.{{sfn|Cohn-Sherbok|2000|p=182}} They state that while Judaism is a messianic religion, its messiah is not Jesus,{{sfn|Simmons|2004}} and thus the term is misleading.<ref name="Lotker"/> All denominations of Judaism, as well as national Jewish organizations, reject Messianic Judaism as a form of Judaism.<ref name="Denominations"/><ref name="JList1"/> The [[Central Conference of American Rabbis]] states that {{"'}}Jewish Christians' or 'Messianic Jews' have never been considered believers in Judaism."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ccarnet.org/rabbinic-voice/platforms/article-commentary-principles-reform-judaism/ |title=Commentary on the Principles for Reform Judaism |publisher=[[Central Conference of American Rabbis]] |access-date=2023-09-16}}</ref> Regarding this divide, [[Reconstructionist Judaism|Reconstructionist]] Rabbi [[Carol Harris-Shapiro]] said: "To embrace the radioactive core of goyishness—Jesus—violates the final taboo of Jewishness. ... Belief in Jesus as Messiah is not simply a heretical belief, as it may have been in the first century; it has become the equivalent to an act of ethno-cultural suicide."{{sfn|Harris-Shapiro|1999|p=177}}

[[B'nai Brith Canada]] considers Messianic activities as antisemitic incidents.<ref name="BB_C_1998"/> Rabbi [[Tovia Singer]], founder of the anti-missionary organization [[Outreach Judaism]], noted of a Messianic religious leader in Toledo: "He's not running a Jewish synagogue. ... It's a church designed to appear as if it were a synagogue and I'm there to expose him. What these irresponsible extremist Christians do is a form of consumer fraud. They blur the distinctions between Judaism and Christianity in order to lure Jewish people who would otherwise resist a straightforward message."<ref name="Singer_Blade"/>

Association by a Jewish politician with a Messianic religious leader, inviting him to pray at a public meeting, even though made in error, resulted in nearly universal condemnation by Jewish congregations in Detroit in 2018,<ref name="Forward103118"/><ref name="NBC103018"/> as the majority opinion in both Israeli and American Jewish circles is to consider Messianic Judaism as Christianity and its followers as Christians.<ref name="WP103018"/>

In 1999, [[Pardes Shalom Cemetery]] in [[Toronto]], Canada, barred Reverend Malvern Jacobs from being buried in the cemetery as Jacobs had converted to Christianity and become a Messianic Jewish minister and [[dean (education)|dean]] of [[Canada Christian College]]'s Jewish Studies department.<ref>{{cite news |title=Messianic Jew Buried At Last |url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/messianic-jew-buried-at-last-1.194483 |access-date=March 14, 2025 |work=CBC News |date=July 29, 1999}}</ref> Pardes Shalom locked its gates to prevent Jacobs's casket and his funeral procession of 400 mourners from entering the cemetery.<ref>{{cite news |title=Cemetery refuses to allow burial of Jewish-born Christian minister |url=https://www.jta.org/1999/06/29/default/cemetery-refuses-to-allow-burial-of-jewish-born-christian-minister |access-date=March 14, 2024 |agency=Jewish Telegraphic Agency |date=June 29, 1999}}</ref>

A small minority of Jewish scholars, notably [[Dan Cohn-Sherbok]], have accepted the practice of Messianic Judaism as a legitimate Jewish religious expression within a "pluralistic model" of Judaism.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Ariel |first=Yaakov |title=Review of Messianic Judaism by Dan Cohn-Sherbok |journal=Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions |volume=7 |issue=3 |year=2004 |pages=119–120 |doi=10.1525/nr.2004.7.3.119 |jstor=10.1525/nr.2004.7.3.119 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/nr.2004.7.3.119 |access-date=November 4, 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |last=Berkman |first=Jacob |title=Questionable Credibility: A Rabbi's Speech Encourages Messianic Jews |magazine=Baltimore Jewish Times |volume=254 |date=August 11, 2000 |page=12 |url=https://www.proquest.com/docview/222813226 |access-date=November 4, 2025 |id={{ProQuest|222813226}} }}</ref> By contrast, most other Jewish thinkers have placed Messianic Judaism outside of mainstream Jewish legitimacy and within the camp of the Christian faith. Some, like [[David Novak]]<ref name=Novak2002>{{cite book |last=Novak |first=David |chapter=When Jews Are Christians |editor-last=Neuhaus |editor-first=Richard John |title=The Chosen People in an Almost Chosen Nation: Jews and Judaism in America |pages=92–102 |publisher=W.B. Eerdmans Publishing |year=2002}}</ref> and [[Michael Wyschogrod]],<ref>{{cite journal |last=Wyschogrod |first=Michael |title=Letter to a Friend |journal=Modern Theology |volume=11 |issue=2 |date=April 1995 |pages=165–171 |doi=10.1111/j.1468-0025.1995.tb00057.x |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-0025.1995.tb00057.x |access-date=November 4, 2025|url-access=subscription }}</ref> have come to the conclusion that Messianic Jews are still halachically Jews even though Messianic Judaism is not at all Jewish. In regard to Jews who convert to Christianity, Novak writes that "these great existential decisions are not meant to be cost-free. In any religious conversion, something is gained and something lost."<ref name=Novak2002 />