The Messianic Ger


     Here we will explore the concept of ger. A person is one of four stations in life: 
1) The House of Judah which consists of the tribes of Judah, Levi, or Benjamin
2) The House of Israel which consists of one of the ten "lost" tribes; 
3) a sojourner who has accepted Yeshua as the promised Messiah and thus trusts in the God of
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; or, 
4) a foreigner who does not accept HASHEM as God.

A listing of 7 words for stranger: ger, ben, nekar, Magur, Zur, Towshav, and Nokriy.

Ger has been fully recognized as the word for "Convert" to accepting HASHEM as God and Yeshua as Mashiach. A widely circulated column by one Messianic author asking the question "Can a Christian covert to Judaism and still be a Christian?" attempts to make a point that the word ger means a non-Jew living with Yisra'el, and they and their children will always be non-Jews. In which case, he is calling tens of thousands of converts non-Jews, in defiance of Scripture! If we are to believe this man, then Rut was not a Jew, nor Yishai (Jesse), nor his son David. Anyone trying to tell me King David was not a Jew will get a rousing laugh from me. What about Sh'lomo? What about the descendants of King David? You are trying to tell me that the majority of the kings of Yisra'el are not Jews? You're trying to tell me that Yeshua was a Gentile?

Yesha’yahu 56:1-8
    
1Thus said HASHEM : Observe justice and perform righteousness, for My salvation is soon to come and My righteousness to be revealed. 2Praiseworthy is the man who does this and the person who grasps it tightly: who guards the Sabbath against desecrating it and guards his hand against doing evil.

     Let not the foreigner, who has joined himself to HASHEM , speak, saying, HASHEM will utterly separate me from His people; and let not the barren one say, Behold I am a shriveled tree. 4For thus said HASHEM : To the barren ones who observe My Sabbaths and choose what I desire, and grasp My covenant tightly: 5In My house and within My walls I will give them a place of honor and renown, which is better than sons and daughters; eternal renown will I give them, which will never be terminated.  6And the foreigners who join themselves to HASHEM to serve Him and to love the Name of HASHEM to become servants unto Him, all who guard the Sabbath against desecration, and grasp My covenant tightly — 7I will bring them to My holy mountain, and I will gladden them in My house of prayer; their Olah-Offerings and their feast-offerings will find favor on My altar.  8The word of my Adonai HASHEM Eloheim, Who gathers the dispersed of Israel: I shall gather to him even more than those already gathered to him.

So, let's hear no more nonsense that "Biblically", a Gentile can never become a Jew. Those of Edomite descent must wait three generations before becoming full Israelite; they must live for three generations as ger, as you'll see below.

D’varim 23:4-9(3-8)
  
4An ammonite or Moabite shall not enter the congregation of HASHEM , to eternity, their tenth generation shall not enter the congregation of HASHEM , 5because of the fact that they did not greet you with bread and water on the road when you were leaving Egypt, and because he hired Balaam son of Beor of Pethor, Aram Naharaim, to curse you. 6But HASHEM, your God refused to listen to Balaam, and HASHEM, your God reversed the curse to a blessing for you, because HASHEM, your God loved you. 7You shall not seek their peace or welfare, all your days, forever. 

     8You shall not reject an Edomite, for he is your brother; you shall not reject an Egyptian, for you were a sojourner in his land. 9Children who are born to them in the third generation may enter the congregation of HASHEM .

It is probable, as we see from B’reshit 9, that Passover was the season of the Ger's journey into Judaism. Whether it was the start, or rather the conclusion of the learning process, B’reshit 9 ties it into conversion. Shavuot (Pentecost) is also traditionally allied with conversion, the transition from ger (alien living with Yisra'el) to adoption (becoming a Jew). It might well be that the Pesach season was the time that the ger began a ritual that lasted 50 days, where a Zur (who kept SOME of the Torah, see the Law concerning carrion) became a ger, and finally an Israelite. The ger was not yet full Israelite:

D’varim 14:21
21You shall not eat any carcass; to the stranger who is in your cities shall you give it that he may eat it, or sell it to a gentile, for you are a holy people to HASHEM , your God; you shall not cook a kid in its mother's milk.

Why was the ger permitted to eat that which died normally, if fit to eat? Although Yisra'el was commanded to "Love the Ger", and not to "hinder the ger", HASHEM knew that Israelites would treat them poorly, and often would pay them less. This allowed the ger to survive. It was a ruling of leniency.

The Toshav appeared to be a hired servant, someone of another nation that indentured themselves to the Israelite. Their exact standing was that they were not involved in the conversion process. Where does the Zur differ?

Commandment 356
Sh’mot 29:32-33
32Aaron and his sons shall eat the ram and the bread that is in the basket before the entrance of the Tent of Meeting. 33They — who received atonement through them — shall eat them, to inaugurate them, to sanctify them; an alien shall not eat for they are holy.

Vayikra 22:10
10No layman (a Zur) shall eat of the holy; one who resides with a Kohen (a Toshav), or his laborer shall not eat of the holy.

Vayikra 22:12-13
12If a Kohen's daughter shall be married to a layman, she may not eat of the separated holies. 13And a Kohen's daughter who will become a widow or a divorcee, and not have offspring, she may return to her father's home, as in her youth, she may eat from her father's food; but no layman may eat of it.

B’midbar 1:51
51When the Tabernacle journeys, the Levi shall take it down and when the Tabernacle encamps, the Levi shall erect it, and an alien who approaches shall die.

B’midbar 17:4-5(16:39-40)
4(16:39)Elazar the Kohen took the copper fire-pans that the consumed ones had offered and hammered them out as a covering for the Altar, 5(16:40)as a reminder to the Children of Israel, so that no alien who is not of the offspring of Aaron shall draw near to bring up the smoke of incense before HASHEM , that he not be like Korah and his assembly as HASHEM spoke about him through Moses.

B’midbar 18:4
4
They shall be joined to you and safeguard the charge of the Tent of Meeting for the entire service of the Tent, and an alien shall not approach you.

We see yet another form of Stranger:

The Nokriy was a foreigner not at all involved in the process of conversion. In other words, not wanting to be a Zur, or a ger, nor the final step of Israelite. Adonai mentions it rarely in Torah:

Commandment 591
D’varim 17:15
14When you come to the Land1 that HASHEM, your God, gives to you, and possess it, and settle in it, and you will say,I will set a king over myself, like all the nations that are around me.15You shall surely set over yourself a king whom HASHEM, your God, shall choose; from among your brethren shall you set a king over yourself;

Commandment 592
you cannot place over yourself a foreign man, who is not your brother.

We see the Nokriy in this verse:

Sh’mot 18:2-3
2Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, took Zipporah, the wife of Moses, after she had been sent away; 3and her two sons: of whom the of one was Gershom, for he said, “I was a sojourner (a Ger) in a strange (a Nokriy) land”; 

Sh’mot 21:8
8If she is displeasing in the eyes of her master, who should have designated her for himself, he shall assist in her redemption; he shall not have the power to sell her to a strange man, for he had betrayed her.

D’varim 14:21
21You shall not eat any carcass; to the stranger (a Ger) who is in your cities shall you give it that he may eat it, or sell it to a gentile (a Ger), for you are a holy people to HASHEM , your God; you shall not cook a kid in its mother's milk.

Commandment 285
D’varim 15:3
3(2)This the matter of the remission: Every creditor shall remit his authority over what he has lent his fellow;

Commandment 286
he shall not press his fellow or his brother, for He has proclaimed a remission for
HASHEM .

Commandment 528
D’varim 15:3
3
You may press the gentile (a Nokriy) but over what you have with your brother, you shall remit your authority.

D’varim 23:21(20)
21You may cause a gentile (a Nokriy) to take interest, but you may not cause your brother to take interest so that HASHEM, your God will bless you in your every undertaking on the Land to which you are coming, to possess it.

D’varim 29:20-21(21-22)
20(21)HASHEM will set him aside for evil from among all the tribes of Israel, like all the imprecations of the covenant that is written in this Book of the Torah. 21(22)The later generation will say — your children who will arise after you and the foreigner (a Nokriy) who will come from a distant land — when they will see the plagues of that Land and its illnesses with which HASHEM has afflicted it:

It seems the Torah has little good to say about Nokriy. We see this progression: Nokriy (someone not at all interested in joining their lives to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob), to Zur (someone taking the first step — usually the B'rit Noach; perhaps the Jerusalem council in Acts was putting the Gentile believer in Yeshua at this status?), to Ger (someone almost completely living as Yisra'elite) to Yisra'elite. 

Since Yeshua commanded all who follow him to eat of the Pesach, it would seem that faith in Yeshua makes a Gentile at least a Zur, if not a ger. What about the Gentile believer in Yeshua who has not yet begun to keep the Noachide covenant, and has no interest whatsoever in becoming an son of Yisra'el? Nowhere is it written one must become an Yisra'elite — This was one of the tenants of the Circumcision party, that you had to convert to be saved. We make no such assertion, nor do we say you should convert (Sha'ul even discourages conversion, in true rabbinical fashion:

Corinthians Rishon 7:20
20Let each one remain in the same calling in which he was called.

Does this mean that a Gentile should not seek to become an Yisra'elite? No; this would be the New Covenant forbidding something that the TaNaKh allows and considers good. Rather, it means that you should be content with your condition (see the verses before and after — it's pretty clear in context). So; there you have it. As for that Gentile believer who does not even keep the Noachide covenant  (the ben Nokriy; son of the foreigner)

Yesha’yahu 56:3-8
     Let not the foreigner, who has joined himself to HASHEM , speak, saying, HASHEM will utterly separate me from His people; and let not the barren one say, Behold I am a shriveled tree. 4For thus said HASHEM : To the barren ones who observe My Sabbaths and choose what I desire, and grasp My covenant tightly: 5In My house and within My walls I will give them a place of honor and renown, which is better than sons and daughters; eternal renown will I give them, which will never be terminated.  6And the foreigners who join themselves to  HASHEM to serve Him and to love the Name of HASHEM to become servants unto Him, all who guard the Sabbath against desecration, and grasp My covenant tightly — 7I will bring them to My holy mountain, and I will gladden them in My house of prayer; their Olah-Offerings and their feast-offerings will find favor on My altar.  8The word of my Adonai HASHEM Eloheim, Who gathers the dispersed of Israel: I shall gather to him even more than those already gathered to him.

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1Israel as a nation had three commandments once it was established in its land: (a) to request a king; (b) to eliminate the offspring of Amalek; and (c) to build the Temple (Sanhedrin 20b).

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