description: In his general introduction Fritz Rothschild quotes these memorable lines of the young Heinrich Have we not endured each other / As true brothers through the ages? / You endured that I kept breathing, / I endured your manic rages.For centuries Jews as a minority in a Christian world have rarely, if ever, voiced their negative views of Christianity without first considering the consequences. Still, despite the long history of so many one-sided debates and discussions, Professor Rothschild finds in the five Jewish thinkers represented in this volume and the five Christian theologians who wrote the individual introductory essays evidence of a new relationship which he characterizes by the term "mutuality."Each of the five Jewish thinkers represents a particular Jewish outlook and each is concerned with what he believes to be the essential nature of Christianity as it appears to him from his historically and existentially conditioned perspective. In turn, each of the Christian "respondents" (J. Louis Martyn on Baeck, Ekkehard Stegemann on Buber, Bernhard Casper on Rosenzweig, Bernhard Anderson on Herberg, and John Merkle on Heschel) deals with the Which Judaism confronts here which type of Christianity?The chief topics dealt with can be listed under the following (1) the person and significance of Jesus; (2) the polarity of law and gospel, works and faith, human righteousness and divine grace; (3) the place of the Hebrew Bible in Christianity; and (4) the role of the church as the New Israel vis-a-vis the Jews as the Old Israel "according to the flesh."While the selections in this volume are for the most part "forthright statements by forthright men," Professor Rothschild offers a fascinating glimpse in his introduction of some of the private reservations of some of these Jewish thinkers, and even blunt criticisms, that never found their way into their published works. The volume concludes with an extensive bibliography by and about the thinkers presented, particularly with regard to their views on Christianity.
language: English
title: Jewish Perspectives on Christianity: Leo Baeck, Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, Will Herberg, and Abraham J. Heschel
titlecomplete: Jewish Perspectives on Christianity: Leo Baeck, Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, Will Herberg, and Abraham J. Heschel
ratings_count: 4
publisher: Crossroad Pub Co