Is Jesus Really the Jewish Messiah?

Let's examine the facts from a Jewish point of view. Not only do the Christians believe that Jesus is their Messiah, but they think that he is the Messiah as foretold by the Jewish Prophets of the Bible, and they try to prove it with quotes from the Bible and missionary organizations such as the Jews for Jesus, which try to entice Jews into converting to Christianity by telling them that they can accept Jesus as their Messiah and still be Jews. Because of these false claims by these missionary groups, Jews must have the facts in order to reaffirm our belief that all the Christian claims that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah is false.

Here are some of the points which demonstrate the blatant discrepancies and inconsistancies in the Missionaries' arguments in favor of Jesus.

• The Jewish Messiah is to be a mortal human being born to two mortal parents. He is neither to be a god, nor a man born of supernatural or virgin birth. There is nothing in the Bible that states that the Messiah would be a god or God-like, or that he would be born to a virgin. The concept of the former contradicts the Jewish concept of God being above and beyond taking human form and limitations. Jews believe that only God should be worshipped, not a being of His creation, not even the Messiah himself. Besides, nowhere in the Bible is there any virgins giving birth. This idea is only found in pagan mythology, where virgins often bare offsping of gods. The only purpose of the concept of virgin birth is to attract pagans to Christianity.
• The Jewish Messiah is supposed to return the Jews to the Holy Land, but Jesus lived while the Jews were still there before they were exiled by the Romans. How can he return them to their land if they were still living in it?
• The Messiah is to rebuild the Jerusalem Temple, but Jesus lived while the Temple was still standing.
• The Bible states that the Messiah will redeem Israel, but 30 years after Jesus died, Jerusalem was destroyed, and the Jews were exiled by the Roman to suffer 1900 years of persecution, mostly by the followers of Jesus.
• The Prophets of the Bible foretold that all the nations of the world will acknowlege and worship the one true God (Isaiah 11.9, 45, and Zephaniah 3), but nothing like this happened after Jesus died; in fact, Islam develpoed and became the religion of many nations while Christianity splintered into many sects which constantly fight each other, and almost two-thirds of the human race worships idols. The world is very far from monotheism even to this day.
• The Messiah's influence will extend to all who will worship God in the Jerusalem Temple. As the Prophet states, "My House will become the House of Prayer for all the Nations. This has clearly not taken place yet; therefore, the Messiah hasn't come yet.
• A new spirit will fill the world man will no longer sin or commit crimes, especially the Jews (Deutteronomy 30: 6, Isaiah 60:21, Jeremiah 50:20, and Ezekiel 36:21). Soon after the days of Jesus, ignorance of God, science, and philosophy filled the earth, and the Dark Ages began.
• If Jesus was God, why did he pray to and talk to himself?
• The true Messiah will reign as King of the Jews. Jesus' carrer as a wandering preacher and "faith healer" lasted only three years until he was crucified by the Romans as a common criminal without any official postition or authority whatsoever.
• One of the Messiah's main tasks is to bring world peace by ending wars and arms manufacturing (Isaiah 2:4). Yet, Christian nations are very war-like, and wars continue to be fought to this day.
• Mark 13:30 and Matthew 4 states that the prophecies about the Messiah would take place during Jesus' generation, but nothing was accomplished after 2,000 years.
• Nohwere does the Bible say that the Messiah would come once, die, and return in a "second coming". Such a concept was a Christian concept meant to rationalize Jesus' failure to function in any way as the Messiah or fulfill the Hebrew Bible's prophecies.
• The Bible says that the Messiah would be descened from King David. If Jesus is the "Son of God", how could he be descened from King David from his father's side?
• Missionaries constantly and deliberatly distort the meaning of the prophets' words in order to substantiate their claims; for example, the Hebrew term in Isaiah , "almah" means "young woman", not "virgin". Honest Christian scholars now admit this is a "pious fraud", and they translate the word correctly in the "Reverse Standard Version" of the Bible.
• If Jesus' raising from the dead was so important to demonstrate who he was, why did it take place in secret instead of in the presence of his "thousands' of followers?
• Jesus claimed that he didn't intend to change the laws of Moses (Matthew 5), but he later abrogated some of the laws, and his followers later abolished or changed nearly all of them; for example, Christians still eat pork and fail to celebrate Yom Kippur or Rosh Hashanna despite what the Torah says. The Torah constantly says that its laws are eternal, and they can't be abolished or changed.
• Judaism believes that God is eternal, above, and beyond time. He can't be born, die, suffer, "become flesh", or be divivded into sections ("Father, Son, and Holy Ghost").
• If Jesus was the Messiah, why does the New Testiment admit that not one of the rabbis of the time accept his claim? Why did all the educated men and prominent men reject him?
• If Jesus was the Messiah, why did most of his own people, the Jews of that time, reject him, including his own family? Why did his followers consist almost completely of a handful of poorly educated people?
• Jesus ordered his followers to preach to the Jews only, not the Gentiles (Matthew 10), but his followers did the exact opposite. He clearly considered himself th Messiah of the Jews only, but he is accepted by foreign nations, and not the Jews.
• The purpose of the Messiah is to bring us to the day when all the Jews will observe the Torah and to teach it to all humankind who will accept its truths. Nowhere in the Torah does it state that the Messiah will abolish it. The Torah is eternal.
• Nowhere in the Torah does it state that forgivness of a person's sins can be brought about by someone else's death. Each man isaccountable for his own sins, and each man must repent of his own sins by changing his ways and seeking God's forgiveness.
• Matthew 1 and Luke 3 both give different accounts of Jesus being descended from King David through his father Joseph.
• If Jesus was the "Son of God", why did he say on the cross, "My God, my God, why did thou foresake me?" instead of "My Father"?

Links

Jews for Judaism.
Anti-Defamation League
Whay Jews Can't Be for Jesus