Jews for Jesus founder dies

In the past, Jews for Jesus have only been mentioned on this blog in terms of my mixed identity and Sarah Palin’s home church. This, though, is a more important occasion: Moishe Rosen, the Jewish-born founder of the evangelistic Christian ministry, has died. He was 78.

A brief report from the AP:

In a press release, Jews for Jesus says Rosen was raised in an Orthodox Jewish family, but converted to Christianity at the age of 21 when he became convinced that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah.

In 1973, he founded the organization whose mission statement is “to make the Messiahship of Jesus an unavoidable issue to our Jewish people worldwide.”

Those evangelistic efforts have been denounced by Jewish groups and by some churches as well.

In a posthumous letter on the Jews for Jesus website, Rosen says: “Within Judaism today, there is no salvation because Christ has no place within Judaism.”

A lot more biographical details about Rosen at the Orlando Sentinel’s religion blog.