“. . .every scribe who has become a disciple of the kingdom of heaven is like a head of a household, who brings out of his treasure things new and old.” Matthew 13:52
Abraham Joshua Heschel’s God in Search of Man is among the foremost works of Jewish theology and spirituality of the past fifty years. Toward the end of the book, Heschel addresses the posture and orientation of the individual Jew within the Jewish community:
“…I am moved by an anxiety for the meaning of my existence as a Jew. Yet when I begin to ponder about it, my theme is not the problem of one Jew but of all Jews… It embraces not only the Jews of the present but also those of the past and those of the future, the meaning of Jewish existence in all ages… The tasks begun and carried out by the patriarchs and prophets, and carried out by countless Jews of the past, are now entrusted to us.”1
Heschel wants to be sure that his readers understand that ours is not a private spirituality, the isolated relationship of one Jew—or any number of individual Jews—with God. The same thought applies to Messianic Jews as part of the larger Jewish community. We share in the fate of all Jews. Like other Jews, our identity vacillates between a private spirituality and a communal ethos.