Jesus was a Jew

Time Magazine has come out with "The 10 ideas that are changing the world" at #10 Re-Judaizing Jesus. The new idea that will change the world is that Jesus was a Jew!!! It is no new Idea that Jesus was Jewish, the proposed problem is that we in the western world have taken Jesus and his teachings out of the context of an eastern Jewish culture. The Emergent Church has tended to embrace this philosophy of a Jewish Jesus, yet they have done a pendulum swing from the Evangelical world in that they over emphasis the Jewish context in Jesus' teachings often adding more than what was original intended. The Emergent Church has brought some amazing depth to the teachings of Jesus, yet they have often gone too far. The modern day evangelical church has done Jesus' Jewish culture wrong as well. Evangelicals are often found using a few contextual examples of Jewish culture to support theological ideals backing beliefs and values of our western culture. Is it even possible for us to truly understand the complete context of the 1st century Judaism that Jesus grew up in, and then filter our exegesis of scripture through these ideas. In fact Judaism has changed so much that it only has a small resemblance today to the Judaism that existed during Jesus' day. Even the Jews that lived during the time of Jesus did not understand the meaning of many of His teachings and they were immersed in this ancient eastern culture. Those that did understand Jesus' teachings only understood through the enabling of the Holy Spirit. In Luke 8:10 Jesus states "The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God has been given to you , but to others I speak in parables, so that, though seeing, they may not see; though hearing, they may not understand." NIV. It seems that every few decades since the time of Jesus we have had new ideas about the meaning of the scriptures, yet these new ideas seem to only support a tolerance to current values or a radical pendulum swing from current culture. No matter through whose eyes the scriptures are seen it is the Holy Spirit that gives us eyes to see and ears to hear. The truths of a fallen world and a human race in need of salvation spans across all cultures and times. What do you think?