FAQ - JEWS
Would you kindly explain the `37th and 38th
verses of Matthew 23` where the Lord said "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest
the prophets, and killest them which are sent unto thee how often would I have gathered
thy children together, even as a bird gathers her brood under her wing, but ye would not!
Behold your house is left unto you desolate?" (H.B.P)
<ANSWER>--The Savior standing upon the Mt. of Olives and gazing out upon
the Holy City, Jerusalem, gave expression to these words with a heart filled with
conflicting emotions. For three and one-half years He had been laying down His life for
the Jewish people in preaching to them the wonderful tidings of the Kingdom of God. He had
healed the sick, comforted the sorrowing and the afflicted, and even raised the dead in
some instances. Now, on this sad day, after having ridden into the city in triumph, and
being rejected by the nation, through their representatives, the Scribes and Pharisees; in
sorrow and with tears, He declared that they as a nation were cast off from Divine favor
and no longer recognized as the chosen people of God. How true to the declaration of the
Lord are the facts of history as outlined in the secular annals of the race! From that
moment they declined in favor, and disaster after disaster came upon them until the nation
was conquered by the Roman arms, and they as a people were scattered abroad throughout the
whole earth to he persecuted, oppressed, and slaughtered by the Gentiles. The Jew is the
miracle of history; "the man without a country." The Lord Jesus, in prophetic
vision, foresaw all the long centuries of afflictions that would come upon them, and in
His sympathy and love, grieved for them, and gave expression to His love by saying
"How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a bird gathers her
brood under her wings, but ye would not!" Corrected Translation.
Does the Bible teach a return of the Jews to Palestine, and is that country
large enough for all of Abraham's descendants? (F.W.)
<ANSWER>--The Bible answer is YES to both questions: (a) "I will open
your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and will bring you again into
the land of Israel." "Ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers;
and ye shall be My people, and I will be your God." "And they shall say, this
land that was desolate is become like the Garden of Eden" (`Eze. 37:12`; `Eze.
36:27-35`). (b) What is known as the land of Palestine is but a very small part of the
promised land, which is to stretch from the Nile to the Euphrates (`Gen. 15:18`), and
appears to include Arabia as well as parts of Egypt and the Soudan, an area equal to the
half of Europe. Much of this is now desert land, but "the desert shall rejoice, and
blossom as the rose." (`Isa. 35:1`.) Thus there will be ample space and abundant
provision made for the Israelites in the promised land--promised for an everlasting
possession to Abraham and his descendants--when God's favor will have returned to them as
foretold by the Prophets--`Rom. 11:25-27`.
Why were the Jews called "God's chosen people?" Were the ancient Jews
different from the modern ones?
<ANSWER>--Abraham was the father of the Jewish people. God made promise to
him, saying, "In thy Seed all the families of the earth shall he blessed."
Jacob, the grandson of Abraham, had twelve sons, who became the head of the twelve tribes
of Israel, or Jews. God made a covenant with His people, saying to them: "If ye will
obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me
above all people, for all the earth is mine: and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests
and an holy nation" (`Exo. 19:5,6`). For more than eighteen centuries God's dealings
were with this people exclusively, as he said through His prophet, "Ye only have I
known of all the families of the earth" (`Amos 3:2`). Time after time God reiterated
His promise that the Messiah should come to them, and when Jesus came the masses of the
Jews were not heeding God's promises: being led by the Clergy class, themselves negligent
of the promises, therefore blind, as Jesus said, "Blind leaders of the blind,"
they rejected Jesus Christ and were cast off from God's favor (`Matt. 23:37-39`). The
words of our Lord clearly imply that God's favor will again return to this people; He
said, "Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is He that cometh
in the name of the Lord." The Apostles point out that God there began to turn his
favor to the Gentiles, and when the requisite number have been selected from among these
to constitute the Kingdom class, as promised, then God's favor will again be shown to the
Jews as a people (See `Rom. 11:1-5 and 25-28`).