A father and son who have been practicing as Orthodox Jews have been accused of secretly being evangelical Christians, The Jerusalem Post has reported. This comes months after an individual living in Jerusalem and posing as an Orthodox Jew was accused of being a covert Messianic Christian missionary, and another family of four, supposed “Christian missionaries,” had posed as Orthodox Jews in the French Hill neighborhood of Jerusalem.
Michael and Calev Isaacson have worked as rabbis in Orthodox Jewish communities throughout the United States, including Portland, Milwaukee, Houston and Phoenix, The Jerusalem Post reported. While in Houston from 2014-2016, Michael Isaacson allegedly worked as a supervisor for the local kashrut association.
The newspaper reports say that the accusations leveled against the Isaacsons were brought to light by Beynenyu, an Israel-based anti-missionary organization, which claims the Isaacsons “have relocated whenever suspicions of the local rabbis were aroused.”
Reports say investigations conducted by the Jewish Chronicle corroborated these claims, revealing that Michael Isaacson, named Michael Dawson until 2019, grew up Lutheran and was married in a Lutheran wedding, and his relatives were “shocked” at his claims of being Jewish.
A family member denied Isaacson’s claims that he had crafted a background of being halachically Jewish with a history of practicing Jewish traditions. The father and the son, the Post reports, have “managed to amass documentation from rabbis, giving validation to their claims.” That includes ordination, with Calev’s semicha being signed off by a rabbi in Arizona, Rabbie Michael Aminov.
The Post reports that the founder of Outreach Judaism Rabbi Tovia Singer, explained that “the Isaacsons are part of a Messianic movement that is a “Christian iteration dedicated to converting Jews’ and that they ‘seek to infiltrate the Jewish community, often by blurring distinctions between Judaism and Christianity to lure Jews who would otherwise resist a straightforward message.'” {eoa}
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