I recently read the book
Called to Controversy: The Unlikely Story of Moishe Rosen and the Founding of Jews for Jesus by Ruth Rosen
and the author explains that MJs did not agree w/ JFJ in many areas.
Is that still true or do they agree on more things now?
I haven't ordered or read the book yet. So, I'm not sure what it says.
Moishe Rosen was one of those bigger then life characters. Head strong too. But very very dedicated to sharing the gospel with the Jewish people.
Most Messianic Jews who came to Yeshua, from the 1970's, 80's and 90's, knew Moishe. He was active and visible among Jewish believers.
First of all, the leaders of the MJAA and JfJ did buck heads with some different views. I saw it as more of a personality thing.
Messianic Judaism wanted to be recognized as a branch of Judaism, and viewed that as key to gaining the acceptance of the Jewish people so that the Jewish people would look at Jesus as someone to be considered whether He is the Messiah or not.
Moishe Rosen's view was different. In his view, Judaism can not accept Messianic Judaism as a branch of Judaism because the issue is Jesus. The only way Messianic Judaism will be considered a branch of Judaism is by the Jewish people accepting Jesus.
So Moishe Rosen worked to share the gospel with the Jewish people, and Messianic Judaism worked more within the Jewish community.
Another complaint from Messianic Judaism was the belief that Jews for Jesus should be sending any new Jewish believers to Messianic Judaism. When I met Moishe, he supported Messianic Judaism (financially) although he did not attend a Messianic Jewish congregation. Moishe used to pray with the new Jewish believers and encourage them to try out different congregations and see where they believed they were called to attend.
While there was tention between Moishe Rosen/Jews for Jesus and Messianic Judaism, most of the leaders of Messianic Judaism, from the 70's and 80's and into the early 90's considered Moishe a friend. Many of the Messianic Judaism related ministries, including Messianic newspapers, were encouraged by Moishe, so many of the leadership attended Moishe's funeral and many spoke at Moishes funeral. Also, many leaders from various Christian groups also spoke at Moishes funeral.