Brother Nathanael is a writer and political and religious activist from the United States. Born to a Jewish family, he had a 'divine encounter' like a light bulb going off in his head that changed the next 50 years of his life.
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school, very traditional home, very strong, judeo scenario.
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How many generations back does that go for well your family
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goes back to his today. I'll tell you about it by a
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story. Rabbis come up to me all the
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time because I look Jewish and they see I have wearing our
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cross. Okay.
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All right they say how I'm dressed they come up and they
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say Your mother Jew. They start with that.
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Okay? Because they trace the race from
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the mother and I say yeah oh yeah my mother Jew 10
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Generations back. And my father Jew 10 Generations
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back, we get a family tree. Now, they're ready to talk to
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me. It's funny.
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Really, what takes a practicing Jewish person from a Jewish
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Family. You know, to where you're at
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today, your beliefs. That's a hard transition, right?
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It's a hard transition, isn't it?
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Oh yeah. But for me, it worked because in
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my bar mitzvah class, when I was 12 preparing for, you know, when
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I was going to turn 13 to be Bar Mitzvah my teacher, mr.
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Schecter and Sabbath School decided, she was going to show
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us why Judaism was his Superior. Religion vote for are not for
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anyone else before us. So she taught us every religion
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Under the Sun. I mean, religions That we never
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heard of in that time. Bhai Zen.
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We never heard of these things in 1962 but she refused to teach
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Christianity. So she gets up at the end of
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class. I still see her.
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She was built like a bull mr. Schecter and says, children were
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supposed to be adults minor children.
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We're not going to study Christianity because it's a very
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tail. And it was invented by a
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self-hating Jew. Named Saul who hated his
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jewishness so much. He changed his name to Paul.
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Alright, so I raised my aunt. I said well after 2 years of
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Western Civilization, I was a smart kid.
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How could this be a fairy tale that did all these people over
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on 2 years, believe in a fairy tale.
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She says, I'm here to teach you, you're not here to teach us.
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That was the end of the discussion.
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All right, so as a kid, 12 years old, I'm taking come on.
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I mean, why do we have to be narrow-minded closed-minded if
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we're Jews and enlightened social?
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Shouldn't we, you know, be a little more open-minded about
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things. So, I decided from then on.
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Okay, because we, I was forbidden to read the New
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Testament at home. I was determined when I get out
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of this synagogue, when I go to college, I'm going to read the
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New Testament myself so I did. But I when I went to college in
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California, Far away from Pittsburgh, where I grew up, and
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I opened up the New Testament, and I read The Gospel, According
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to st. Matthew.
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And just by the genealogies, that traces, the the descendants
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of Jesus Christ with all these Jewish names, that convinced me
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just two genealogies, but I kept on, reading, reading reading.
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And then I said yes Jesus. The Jewish Messiah.
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Then I call my Rabbi and all hell broke loose.
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Sure. Well, what made it?
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The 18 inches from your head though where you mentally
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figured that out? To where you were a changed
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person inside, where it became a real living reality.
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Well, I think it was because when I went to visit my
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grandmother soon, after that bar, mitzvah encounter class
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encounter, the rabbi comes from visiting my grandmother.
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Who is ill, okay. And was she going to die and
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this was kind of scary for me. I love my grandmother.
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We are very close. So the rabbi comes out of the
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elevator, the hotel lobby, and I said mr.
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Schecter won't teach us about Christianity, we should learn
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about Jesus Christ, and he spits on the hospital floor.
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Okay. I'm a kid 12 years old.
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He's spitting on a hospital for the rabbi.
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He says, don't you ever use that word unless you use it as a
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purse? Where As always, and I'm saying
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to him, I was, I still was couldn't get over the shock of
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him spitting on a hospital floor.
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And this made such an impact on me that I think I needed another
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great impact and reading The Gospel, According to st.
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Matthew, which is very rare because he keeps on referring
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back to the Old Testament prophecies.
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But never understood, it was like a light bulb going off.
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In my mind that the Messiah would be born of a virgin that
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were the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem that Messiah would
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come before the destruction of the second temple that the
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Messiah would conquer death. I mean, it was like a light bulb
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going. I'm often me and that changed my
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life can. Yeah, it changed my life.
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We got an airport here. There's an l a copter.
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Are they coming after you? Wow, that looks like an army,
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you know. So I think the army trains
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through wants to well. Anyways, they're not coming
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after me.