Jewish Views of Jesus: Their Significance for Christian Faith

Lecture by Michael Heinzmann, Ph.D.
Wednesday, September 16, 2015, 4:15 p.m.
Quad 264, Saint John's University

Throughout most of Christian history, Jesus was presented as standing apart from rather than within the world of pre-rabbinic Judaism and as offering Christianity as a replacement for Judaism. But since the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) these traditional teachings have been repudiated in official documents of the Roman Catholic Church and some other Christian churches, in which the Jewishness of Jesus and the ongoing validity of Judaism have been affirmed. Writings by Jewish scholars have played an important part in helping Christians understand Jesus within his first-century Jewish context, and German Catholic scholar Michael Heinzmann will explore views of Jesus held by of several leading Jewish scholars. He will also discuss what he regards as the significance of these views for the understanding and practice of Christian faith.

Michael Heinzmann is assistant professor of Jewish studies and religious studies at the University of Potsdam, a public university in the Berlin-Brandenburg region of Germany. He earned his Ph.D. at the Institute for Jewish Studies at the University of Vienna and also pursued advanced studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. A specialist in Jewish philosophical thought, Dr. Heinzmann has taught a wide variety of courses, including courses on biblical hermeneutics, rabbinic literature, Jewish history and culture, Jewish art and music, Jewish law and ethics, Kabbalah, modern Israeli society, and Judaism in relation to both Christianity and Islam. He has numerous essays, mostly on Jewish themes, published in scholarly journals and books and he is an active contributor to interfaith dialogue in Germany and beyond.

Sponsored in collaboration with the CSB/SJU Department of Theology