Nehemiah Gordon – an anti-missionary?

(UPDATE: Nehemiah Gordon responded to this post, explaining his side of things: the anti-missionary website linked below was inherited from Gordon's mentor, Mordechai Alfandari, after his death. Gordon explains his heart has never been into anti-missionary work. Read his response and decide for yourselves.)

In yesterday’s post, I relayed a letter from prominent Karaite Nehemiah Gordon regarding his views on Yeshua, Messianics, Jews, and Christians:

I have not converted to Christianity nor do I attempt to convince anyone to change their faith. [Emphasis mine]
Let me start with my views on Jesus of Nazareth, or as he was known 2000 years ago, "Yeshua". Over the past few years I have gained a great respect for his teachings, but I have not embraced the Christian faith nor have I become a "Messianic Jew." I clearly state this in all of my presentations in order to avoid any possible confusion.
…
As a Karaite Jew, I await the coming of an anointed King (in Hebrew: "Messiah") who will be a direct descendant of King David. I have no idea what his name will be and therefore I do not rule out the possibility that his name will be "Yeshua".

Despite Gordon’s claims that he does not try to convert Messiah’s disciples to the Karaite religion, it’s been brought to my attention that Gordon actually runs an anti-missionary site.

This makes Gordon’s letter ring hollow and deceptive.


I don’t lightly throw around the term deceptive, but it would appear Gordon is deceiving people when he says he he doesn’t try to convert people to the Karaite religion, then behind the scenes, operates a site that will try to persuade you, with all the tired arguments, to abandon our hope in the King.

Perhaps this shouldn’t be surprising: modern Jewish anti-missionaries borrow much of their arguments from a famous medieval Karaite anti-Yeshua work. Karaites have a history when it comes to denying the Master.

I am contemplating removing yesterday’s post as I have no interest in promoting false statements from folks who, lip service aside, ultimately reject the Messiah and apparently try to persuade others to do the same.