Thecolorsblend is correct. This definitely does not belong in the Traditional Theology subform, as it's actively against the tradition of the Christian Church.
Imitating the Jews is really silly at best, and theologically suspect at worst. If you don't speak first century Galilean Aramaic natively -- and you don't -- there's no reason to use anything other than Jesus in the English language. Whenever I see someone here on CF use "Yeshua", "Hamasiach" or any of this other stuff, I don't think "Wow! How reverent to be using an approximation of these names and terms in faux-Aramaic/Hebrew!", I think "Oh, here's another person who disregards the Apostolic Council in Jerusalem (found in the NT itself, in the Acts of the Apostles), in which Judaizing was condemned from the mouth of the Church herself."
It's like shorthand for "I don't know my history, and because my form of Christianity likely has no apostolic roots itself (NB: You don't see Orthodox or Catholics or the more historically-rooted protestants like traditional Lutherans or traditional Presbyterians advancing this kind of thinking), the only culture I can identify with in the Bible is the Jewish culture, so I think it's somehow more holy or something to act like Judaism is somehow a salvific way of life, hence I ought to imitate the Jews."
No. No you shouldn't. Ministering to Jews is no different than ministering to anyone else, in that Jews are not some kind of special population such that someone who is a Jew and has never believed in Christ and whose religion commands that he or she not do so is to be treated better or differently than anyone else for whom the same is true, e.g., the Muslim, the Shintoist, etc. I do not care if some 'Messianic Jew' says otherwise, because that's
not traditional either (Messianic Judaism does not significantly predate the 1960s), and 99.999% of people who describe themselves that way are just run of the mill Protestants of this or that variety who got bored one day and decided to pretend that they're special because they can pronounce "Hanukkah" correctly.
Hymn on Unleavened Bread XVII by St. Ephrem the Syrian (Edmund Beck transl., 1964)
1. Nisan that renews every plant
could not revive the aged People.
Refrain: Blessed is he who rejected the People and their matza
Since their hands were defiled with precious blood!
2. For when the People went forth they bore
leaven of idolatry along with matza.
3. In Egypt Moses forbade them to knead yeasted dough
together with(1) his matza. (
Exod 12.15)
4. By this means he taught them not to hide
Egyptian leaven within their mind.
5. Matza is a symbol of the bread of life;
those of old ate the new mystery.
6. Moses disclosed the symbol of the One who renews all
and gave it to gluttons who craved flesh.
7. Meat from the earth weighed them down –
their mind stooped to greed.
8. The earthly ones ate heavenly manna (
Exodus 16 etc.)
They became dust on the earth through their sins
9. Spiritual bread flew lightly away
The Gentiles soared up and settled in the midst of Paradise.
…
14. Matza’s nature is heavy
Symbolising the People that cannot fly.
15. Elijah ate from the pitcher and jug (
1 Kings 17.14)
the light symbol that flew through the air
16. It was not a Daughter of Jacob who provided the symbol:
Elijah ate it through that Daughter of the Gentiles (
i.e. the widow of Zarephath)
17.If the [mere] symbol of [Christ’s] bread made [Elijah] fly like that (
2 Kings 2.11)
How much more may it transport Gentiles to Eden?
+++
St. Ephrem the Syrian (306-373) is venerated in basically every tradition which has kept alive some idea of the communion of saints -- i.e., Orthodoxy, Catholicism, the Church of the East/Nestorians, and the Anglican communion (probably others too, but this is as listed on wiki). His views were not outside of the mainstream of Christianity in his time nor afterwards, and have only become distasteful to Christians for whom the modern secular state of Israel and a very non-traditional eschatology has overwhelmed their desire to actually follow Christianity (hence they identify with and care more for the Jews and their own eschatological vision than for anything like traditional Christianity and Christians), or for those who want to just get along with everyone and hence find such talk to be worthy of an apology to the Jews. That's very much against the holy scriptures, however, and traditional Christians (including some whose churches unfortunately follow this tendency of "let's apologize to the Jews", as below) see nothing to apologize for in what the NT says:
Please note that none of this means that we ought to treat Jews badly for being Jews, but we certainly should not imitate them. The Christian Church has already baptized everything that can be baptized (read: brought into the Church) of Jewish belief and practice, so those who advocate for more on any basis are quite simply wrong to do so.
It has long been recognized by scholars and laymen alike that the most outwardly 'Hebraic' of all Christian traditions -- that of the Ethiopians and Eritreans who follow the traditional Orthodox Tewahedo churches of their homelands -- nevertheless contains strong rebukes of the Jews as written into their liturgical prayers, as during the preparatory prayers of the liturgy they do proclaim
"Therefore let us not be circumcised like the Jews, for we know that He Who had to fulfill the Law has come" (by which they mean Jesus, of course).
Besides, those Christians whose languages are closest to the Aramaic of Jesus (still not the same, but since Palestinian Aramaic is no longer spoken, it's the closest you'll get) -- those Christian traditions which keep alive some form of Neo-Aramaic and use Syriac in their liturgies (the Syriac Orthodox, the small number of Eastern Orthodox Assyrians in Russia, various Catholic Syriac people, and the Nestorians) -- don't even do this. In their languages,
He is 'Isho Mshiho or 'Isho Mshiha, not Yeshua Hamasiach or whatever.
Prayer in Eastern Syriac pronunciation (i.e., either Chaldean or Nestorian) that uses His name properly. (In the Indian Syriac churches, you can find something like Yeshua, but that's likely first language interference, not a proper pronunciation of the Syriac form of His name. Indians usually can't get the pronunciation of certain sounds in Syriac, like the pharyngealized sounds, or the "th" sounds which become "s" more often than not. This is why I chose a Chaldean or Nestorian above, as they presumably grew up around a modern form of the language in their communities, while the Indian Syriacs usually speak Malayalam, which is totally unrelated to any form of Syriac or Aramaic.)
