Another Perspective on Orthodoxy and “Shallow Theology”

By Julie Martinez

            In Judaism, there are many “denominations”, from Orthodox to Reform, from Reconstructionist to Unaffiliated, each synagogue has its own practice, its own teachings,  and its own traditions.

             As a child growing up, I was in one of the most liberal of Jewish groups, the Reform.  In it, I was taught that the Bible (meaning the Hebrew Scriptures, what Christians call the Old Testament) was a story about our people, and because of it, we are still a people today.  However, nobody could say whether or not these stories really happened.   Was there ever a person named Abraham?  Well, we can’t say for sure, it may just be a metaphor for the beginnings of our people.  It isn’t important whether or not he was a real person, the important thing is the lessons we get from the story.  Is there really a Messiah?  Probably not, at least not a person.  Think of it in the way that if we all do the right thing, and keep the law as best we can, then we will help usher in a new world of peace, which is what the Messianic message is all about.  (Ironically, all the prayers we recited in the synagogue services, and during the special holiday prayers, still referred to a living Messiah who would descend from David and save God’s people from their sins.  Somehow this inconsistency was never addressed!)

             In the same way, we asked, Is there really a God, then, who gave us His Torah on Mt. Sinai, chose us as His people, and expects us to live a certain way?  Well, we can’t say that for sure either.  It seems like quite a stretch of the imagination that God, if He existed, would have revealed Himself to so many people.  But the story is the important thing, and the Torah is the important thing.  Do we have to keep the Torah?  Well, of course, we can’t possibly keep everything in the Torah, and if there is a God he certainly doesn’t expect us to.  The whole point is that we should just do “our best”

             Even as a young child, I knew that I did not always do “my best”.  I wondered why we bothered going to services if we weren’t even sure there was a God, or if what the Torah teaches isn’t really true.  When I became old enough to make my own choices, I decided against having a Bat Mitzvah, and did not enter a synagogue again for decades.

            However, during that time, an orthodox Rabbi in Israel had been causing quite some controversy throughout American Judaism. His contention was that people who did not believe in the God of Israel, in Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and did not observe the Torah were not “real Jews”, and therefore should not be able to immigrate to Israel.  This caused quite a stir among the people I knew, none of whom wanted to make aliyah, but I heard comments such as, “How insulting!”  “How unloving!”  After all, are we not all still Jews, descended from the same ancestors?  Just because we didn’t believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible like they did, does that mean we are any less Jews?  Fake Jews?

             At the time, this meant little to me, what some old Rabbi said in Jerusalem had no effect on my life.  But, decades later, when I went to Jerusalem for the first time, and saw the dedication to God in these orthodox people, I realized that I had missed something.  The first thing I did was examine my own beliefs, taught to me in childhood, and I could not help but see the inconsistency and ridiculousness of it.  I was able to see that there were some people who really did believe that God exists, that Abraham was a real person, and that things happened exactly the way the Bible says they did.  In that case, however, I was confronted with the uncomfortable conclusion that God did give us the law, and did indeed intend for us to keep it.  And what a miserable job of that I had done.  I had not even done “my best”, because many times in life I did things I knew were wrong, just because I wanted to.

             So now what?  For me, this started a long journey of trying to “make up for lost time”, becoming observant, going back to services, especially the High Holy Days services and the Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when we beg God’s forgiveness.  I learned a lot, but I knew intrinsically that doing all the “right things” now did not somehow make up for all the wrong things.  And even worse, I continued to do wrong things, even when I didn’t want to.  It really seemed quite hopeless.   

            About that time is when I read one of Pastor Bolland’s newspaper articles, when talked about the difference between Christianity and all other religions.  In it, he said that all other religions depend on trying very hard to do the right thing, but in Christianity, God has, through Jesus Christ, done all the right things for us, and that through Him, the Messiah of the world, our sins are forgiven and we have the salvation God has always promised.  At first, this message made me angry, primarily because it really struck a nerve.  Here I was, trying so hard to do what was right, and here is someone who says that is not going to work.  (And truly, it was not working).

             To make a long story short, this newspaper article eventually brought me into Pastor Bolland’s office, where I heard who Jesus really is.  Through some long, difficult months, he helped me see that those Orthodox Rabbi’s were right about one thing.  The scriptures truly are God’s Word to us, every word of them, and God does expect us to keep the law.  However, he also gave me the good news, and that is that Jesus, the Messiah of God for all people, has already kept the law for us, and through His death on the cross, He has given us forgiveness for all the wrongs we have ever done, and ever will do. 

             In short, the liberal teachings I learned as a child were wrong.  If I had not heard the words of the controversy between the orthodox and reform rabbis, I would never have even heard the idea that the Bible is truly God’s word, every letter, every word, and everything it taught.  This was the most important thing I could have learned, and thank God that I did, because when I then was presented with it by an orthodox Lutheran pastor, God had already prepared me to hear that message, so that He could call me to Himself through faith in Jesus Christ.  I was able to read the material he gave, take it to the scriptures, and find no inconsistency (even when I tried!).  This depth of theology and commitment to the truth of the scriptures is a real treasure, which all of us, as Lutherans, hold together, as a priceless, gift from God. 

            And thank God for a faithful, orthodox, Pastor, who spent a lot of time and energy proclaiming this good news to me, in ways that drew me deeply into the rich and deep theology of Orthodox Lutheran theology, and who had the courage to say, “This is the truth, because it is what God says!”.