Israel and the Church: Two Voices for the Same God

By Jacques Doukhan

Book Overview

""My standpoint is then one of tension, a tension that I bear in my flesh and in my intellectual and spiritual life: I heard the two voices. And it is the weight of this tension that has pressed me to... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1565636163
• ISBN13: 9781565636163
• Release Date: January 2002
• Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
• Length: 108 Pages
• Weight: 0.44 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.3" x 0.5" x 5.3"

Customer Reviews

Presents some fresh insights, but ignores some important facts

This is a delightful and informative book that will offer some under-represented facts to the church, and also explain some miss-understood concepts to Jews. For example, Doukhan does a great job in the opening chapter to show how Yeshua (Jesus) was a Jewish man who taught as did the sages of the era of the Talmud. Many other authors have of course done this, but Doukhan has a nice summary here. Especially relevant is a debunking of the concept that grace was "invented" by Christianity. Even a casual reading if the Torah shows this was a concept long instilled within the Jewish Scriptures. I was happy to see that Doukhan does a good job to explain how both Jews and Christians have faulted each other. He explains, in more ways than I have seen, how the original Jewish believers eventually moved away from their Jewish roots and how this influenced Jewish-Christian relations. And such a book would not be complete without the customary discussion of replacement theology and the Christian rejection of the Jewish Scriptures. I think even those who have studied these topics will find some new insights here. But the book is not without problems. The author seems to ignore critical evidence to support his opinion sometimes. For example, he states that Yeshua was well received in the synagogue, citing Luke 4. But he forgets to mention, that in the very next verse, that those who heard him in the synagogue rushed to throw him out shortly thereafter. He downplays the significance of the Jewish revolts and the strains this placed on Jewish-Christian relations. Too often he generalizes that "a majority" of Jews followed Yeshua ... although many Christian commentators forget that some Jews (and even Rabbi's) did follow the Messiah. His assertion that violence against the original Jewish believers (i.e., Acts) was "not common" is unconvincing. There is not a clear understanding of Acts 15. And he never does explain what he mans that Jews and Christians are "two voices for the same God." In summary, this book does a good job of setting the record straight about a history of conflict between Christianity and Judaism (Rabbinic). I applaud the author for offering some fresh, thought-provoking perspectives on the topic. Doukhan does a great job to present little-known facts that tent to get downplayed, both in the Church and in the Synagogue. But sometimes the author swings too far in his attempts to balance the scales and marches into error. Still, the book has great use if one is careful. As a leader in a Messianic Congregation, I do recommend the book.