Messianic Jewish commentary by David Stern could be helpful in detailing some Jewish perspective on the verse 1Cor 9:20
With Jews, what I did was put myself in the position of a Jew, literally, “I became to the Jews as a Jew.” Three times in these
verses Sha’ul says he “became as,” and once that he “became,” the
distinctive attribute of a group of people; lastly he summarizes by
saying that he has “become,” as KJV puts it, “all things to all men”
(v. 22)—a phrase which today connotes being a deceiver or a chameleon
who changes his behavior to suit his audience for the sake of an
ulterior goal. We know that Sha’ul rebuked Kefa for behaving in this
way (Ga 2:11–16&NN), but did he play the hypocrite himself? To the
same Corinthian readership Sha’ul later wrote, “We refuse to make use
of shameful underhanded methods” (2C 4:1–2&N), and then used three
chapters of that letter to defend himself against such charges (2
Corinthians 10–12). He could hardly expect them to believe him there
if in the present passage they were to understand him as teaching that
the end justifies the means. More specifically, modern critics take
this passage to mean that Sha’ul observed the Torah when he was with
Jews but dispensed with it when with Gentiles. And not only those with
an axe to grind say this of him; well-meaning Christian commentators
friendly to him often appear to have an ethical blind spot which
Sha’ul’s critics can exploit. However, I believe the commentators’
deficiency is not in the area of ethics but in the area of exegesis.
Their misunderstanding of these verses forces them into a cul-de-sac
from which their only escape is to appear to justify, or at least
overlook, dissembling for the sake of the Kingdom of God. For they
give his circumcising Timothy (Ac 16:1–3) as an example of “becoming
as a Jew to the Jews” and “as under law to those under law”; and they
cite his eating with Gentiles, whose food, presumably, was non-kosher
(Ga 2:11–14&NN), to illustrate his “becoming as apart from law to
those apart from law.” They reveal thereby three misinterpretations:
(1) They think “becoming as” means “behaving like,”
(2) They think “under law” means “expected to obey the Torah” and as a
consequence equate “the Jews” with “those under law,”
(3) They seem unaware of the fact that being Jewish is not something
one can put on or off at will.
In regard to the last of these, I have pointed out that Sha’ul never
considered himself an ex-Jew (Ac 13:9N, 21:21). So even if he had not
been a man of integrity, even if he had been willing to put on a
façade of observing Jewish customs among Jews but not among Gentiles,
he could hardly have flouted Jewish law among Gentiles without having
his duplicity discovered and his credibility undone.
Since Sha’ul remained a Jew all his life, we can eliminate another
misinterpretation of “becoming as”—“becoming something that one
formerly was not.” In principle such exegesis could apply to Sha’ul’s
becoming as “outside the Torah” (v. 21) or “weak” (v. 22), but not to
his becoming as a Jew, since he already was one. One Gentile believer
who converted to Judaism in order to evangelize Jews argued that by
becoming “as a Jew to the Jews” he was only imitating Sha’ul. This I
reject, for Sha’ul does not mean he changed his religious status or
philosophical outlook to that of his hearers (but see 7:18&NN, Ga
5:2–4&N).
No, Sha’ul did not play charades in “becoming as” the people around
him. What he did was empathize with them. He put himself in their
position (hence the lengthy phrase I use to translate “became as”). He
entered into their needs and aspirations, their strengths and
weaknesses, their opportunities and constraints, their ideas and
feelings and values—in short, to use the current vernacular, he tried
to understand “where they were coming from.” In addition he made a
point of doing nothing to offend them (10:32). Having established
common ground with those he was trying to reach, he could then
communicate the Good News in patterns familiar to them, using
rabbinical teaching methods with Jews, philosophical thought-forms
with Greeks. With the “weak” he could bear with their
overscrupulousness, because he understood its origin (8:7–12). He did
everything possible to overcome all barriers—psychological, social,
and especially cultural; for he knew that the task of communicating
the Good News had been entrusted to him (vv. 15–18, 23), and he could
not expect others to meet him halfway. But he never condescended by
imitating or feigning ungodliness or legalistic compulsiveness or
“weak” scrupulosity, for the degree to which he would change his
behavior to make them feel at ease was always constrained by his
living “within the framework of Torah as upheld by the Messiah” (v.
21). Moreover, Sha’ul’s strategy of removing unnecessary barriers
between himself and those whom he hoped to win to faith, far from
being outside the pale of what Judaism can consider ethical behavior,
was anticipated by Hillel when he accepted as a proselyte a Gentile
who insisted on being taught the Torah “while standing on one foot”
(Shabbat 31a, quoted in Mt 7:12N; but on this also see David Daube’s
The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism, University of London: The
Athlone Press, 1956; reprinted by Arno Press, 1973; Part III, chapter
11).
In order to win Jews. In v. 19 Sha’ul announced that his goal was “to win as many people as possible,” that is, as many of all kinds of
people as he could. By “winning” them, of course, he means getting
them to realize that they are sinners who need God’s forgiveness and
can obtain it only by accepting Yeshua’s atoning death on their
behalf. For a discussion of the Jewish antecedents of the Greek word
for “win,” kerdainoÆ, see Part III, chapter 12 of Rabbi Daube’s book
cited above.
Note that Jews are not exempt from needing God’s forgiveness through
Yeshua; if they were, Sha’ul would not be making efforts “to win
Jews.” Those in the Jewish community today who object to evangelistic
targeting of Jews should be aware that Sha’ul gave “winning Jews” as
one of his specific goals; and at the end of this section of his
letter he exhorts believers to imitate him (11:1). Those who urge
followers of Yeshua to desist from evangelizing Jewish people are
either unaware of what this verse means or consciously inciting them
to violate a religious precept.
