Hoping to combat anti-Jewish sentiments among Christians,...
Hoping to combat anti-Jewish sentiments among Christians, the western states region of B’nai B’rith International has jointly financed with Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) a 14-part television series emphasizing the Jewishness of Jesus and of the early churches.
In seeking the production of a documentary that would “disseminate correct historical information” about Jesus and his first followers, Opher Segal of Los Angeles approached researcher-broadcaster Roy Blizzard of Austin, Tex.
Blizzard has hosted “Inside Israel,” “Our Jewish Roots” and a 13-week series titled “The Quest--In Search of the Historical Jesus” on the conservative Protestant network based in Tustin. He also has been a frequent guest on TBN’s “Praise the Lord” talk show hosted by network owner Paul Crouch.
Shimon Erem, president of B’nai B’rith’s 10-state western district, added that the organization wanted to “re-establish bridges with the evangelical community.” Erem said that B’nai B’rith contributed between $50,000 and $100,000 to the project filmed in Israel.
In announcing the venture this week, however, Blizzard conceded that his picture of the historical Jesus is based on research by the Jerusalem School for the Study of the Synoptic Gospels, which disputes many prevailing views in New Testament studies.
Most scholars who study the Gospels with similar story lines--Mark, Matthew and Luke--believe that Mark was written first, about 40 years after Jesus’ crucifixion and that it provided the basic narrative for Matthew and Luke. Blizzard said the Jerusalem School concludes that Luke was written first but that all three Gospels were based on a common account of Jesus written much earlier in Hebrew.
Contrary to most New Testament scholarship, Blizzard and the Jerusalem School maintain that Jesus spoke in Hebrew, not Aramaic, and his followers wrote in that language--not in Greek, the cross-cultural written language used in all the New Testament books.
“Jesus was a great Jewish teacher who said almost nothing original,” Blizzard added in an interview. “His words are very much like what rabbis said before him.”
Blizzard said he opposes the Jews for Jesus movement and other proselytizing groups that contend that faithful Jews have an “incomplete” religion without Christianity. He acknowledged that TBN does carry programs espousing that view.
Somewhat embarrassed by their late announcement, Blizzard and the B’nai B’rith officials also said that TBN began showing the series, titled “Treasures of the Jewish World,” 11 weeks ago--and at 4:30 a.m. PST.
“Paul Crouch has promised us a better time slot in reruns,” Blizzard said.
CONVENTION
A resolution praising the creation last year of the traditionalist Episcopal Synod of America may be considered today by the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego, holding its annual convention at St. Margaret’s Church in Palm Desert. “It would be very significant if it passes,” said synod spokesman L.W. Thompson of Ft. Worth, Tex. “We have close to 40 parishes which have affiliated with us and 20 chapters that have formed since we began last June. But we have not had any diocese express official support,” he said. The resolution, as submitted to the convention, declares that the 20,500-member San Diego diocese would recognize the synod as a group of “loyal Episcopalians . . . providing a way through which traditionalists can express and propagate their legitimate view of the historic apostolic faith.”
PEOPLE
Tony Melendez, 28, the armless entertainer who played guitar with his feet for Pope John Paul II during the pontiff’s 1987 visit to Los Angeles, is planning to marry Lynn Zechman, 23, a Catholic youth ministry worker in Dallas next August, according to a report by Catholic News Service. Melendez, a native Nicaraguan born without arms, had been singing and playing guitar with his feet at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Baldwin Park and at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Chino for five years before the Pope’s visit. But when the Pope left the Universal Amphitheater stage to congratulate Melendez with a hug and a kiss, the young man’s music career and recognition escalated.
The Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr., executive director of the United Church of Christ’s Commission for Racial Justice, will preach Sunday at the 10 a.m. installation service for the new pastor of the interracial Congregational Church of Christian Fellowship in Los Angeles. Installed will be the Rev. Madison T. Shockley II, 34, a minister in a different denomination--the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Chavis was one of the “Wilmington 10” exonerated by a Federal Court on criminal charges stemming from civil rights work in Wilmington, N.C., in the early 1970s. He recently said he and three other black men were the unnamed targets of racist threats in news reports at Chapel Hill, N.C., during mid-January Martin Luther King birthday observances.