“Covenants, Messiahs, and Religious Boundaries. [Review of ‘For the sake of Heaven and Earth: The new encounter between Judaism and Christianity’, by Irving Greenberg]

Abstract

Of course there are profound differences between Jesus of Nazareth and the Lubavitcher Rebbe, but Jews rejected the messiahship and divinity of Jesus for reasons of deep principle that transcended his personal characteristics. It is this deep principle that the Orthodox rabbinate has betrayed in the last decade. Now that I have learned about something called a covenantal anathema, I am tempted to invoke one against the large number of Orthodox rabbis who accept Lubavitch messianists as religious authorities and functionaries and then rail against Greenberg. In fact, however, there is no need for anathemas or for the comical conceit that I am qualified to pronounce them. It requires nothing more than common decency to recognize that anyone who accords Orthodox legitimacy to adherents of posthumous false messianism and even of avoda zara is morally obligated to allow Irving Greenberg to say anything he wishes about failed messiahs, unfinished messiahs, and even messiahs who are God in the flesh. (from Conclusion)