Joseph of Arimathea, a Pharisee, gave Jesus his own family tomb for burial.

Gamaliel, a Pharisee whose teachings are featured in the Talmud, saved the lives of Peter James and John, declaring that Jews should wait and see whether Christianity was of God, and not stand against it.

The Book of Mormon teaches us specifically in 2nd Nephi that the ancient covenant that God made with Israel is still valid. The Jews are still covenant people.

We should not commit the error of sectarians and ask when the Jews will be saved. All of us were saved two thousand years ago when Christ took our sins upon him, and we all receive God’s salvation if and when we accept it, whether in this life or in the next. The New Testament speaks of many Jews having their hearts closed to the spirit as part of God’s will. Obviously no one will be damned simply because God’s plan didn’t involve their receiving a spiritual witness of Jesus Christ during this lifetime.

Judaism technically came after Christianity. From Adam to Enoch to Noah to the brother of Jared to Abraham to Joseph we can see the fullness of the gospel, to a greater or lesser extent. Christians today think O.T. = Law of Moses. I remember being very lucky/inspired when, while on my mission in Texas, remarking to a Church of Christ minister (during a ‘friendly gospel discussion’) that “Abraham didn’t live under the Law of Moses.” His jaw fell open, speechless. Such a concept!

Ironically, today’s Jews sometimes have a rather narrow view of OT history as well. I recently saw a rabbi on a TV program refer to Moses as a Jew. As far as I know, Israel has yet to celebrate a Jubilee. And they don’t seem to realize that they are not ‘Israel’ — they are ‘Judah.’ We, Ephraim, are Israel scattered among the gentile nations. As Isaiah foretold:

“One shall say, I am the LORD‘s; and another shall call himself by the name of Jacob; and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the LORD, and surname himself by the name of Israel.” (44:5)

I think our attitude toward the Jews ought to be the same as our attitude toward the Protestants, Catholics, Muslims, Hindus, Atheists and every other people — brothers and sisters of Heavenly Father for whom there is a time and a place to hear the truth. We treat them as neighbors and when the Spirit prompts, we open our mouth. I’m thankful for the insight of Joseph Smith who helped the early saints overcome some of the prevailing antisemitism of their day, which I’m sure was due to simple ignorance. I look forward to reading Epperson’s book.

I want to be clear that as a Jew who works on some aspects of Mormon history since about 1993 I have always been welcomed by LDS scholars and church memebers. Since the baptism of the dead controversey a few months back, I have been trying to bone up on the church’s theology and practice a bit more and came across McConkie in a bookstore. I didn’t buy it. I was also disappointed that besides the Book of Mormon there were no clearly pro-Mormon books or even Jan Shipps (is that out of print?). Lots (out of maybe 13 books total) of crummy anti work though. The whole secton paled in size to fake Native American stuff (aka white shamanism) so it could have been worse.

The FARMS review to which you point seems to me to be very odd as a review. It doesn’t really address Epperson’s fundamental claims, but instead takes a tangent–what the Book of Mormon teaches about the Jews–and argues with Jeppson about that.

http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?table=review&id=191

Personally, I really liked Epperson’s book, and I thought identifying the two main strains of Mormon thought towards the Jews–a supersessionist one derived from our Protestant roots, and a more ecumenical one derived from Joseph himself–was instructive. I personally am partial to Joseph’s phil-Semitic thought. Many of Epperson’s reviewers rightly pointed out that his thesis didn’t adequately take into account contrary statements in the literature, but I still like Epperson’s take as an expression of an ideal, even if it is not the total reality.

“Christianity includes Judaism. There would have been no Christianity had there been no Judaism; no Christian superracial, supernational community bearing the revelation of God, had there been no Jewish racial, national community bearing the revelation of God. Modern Christians tend to forget how Jewish our Christianity is. Our theology has so focused attention upon Jesus as a self-poised figure, and has been so concerned to magnify the originality of his mind (as if thereby
we could add to his honor), that we have glossed over our indebtedness to Judaism for the structural and constitutive substance of our
Christian faith. Yet our existence and outlook as a Christian community are not only historically conditioned by, but shot through with, the
divine revelation which was carried uniquely by the community of Israel.

“The most obvious evidence of this is the fact that the Old Testament, which is the sacred literature of the Jewish people, is also cherished as the sacred literature of the Christian church. Not only so, but for the first century of its existence Christianity had no other canonical writings. The continuing integral relation of the Old Testament to
Christianity is illustrated in our worship services by the reading of two lessons, one from the Jewish Scriptures and a second from the specifically Christian Scriptures. . .

“Moreover, most if not all of the New Testament was written by Jews. The first Christians were all Jews. The synagogue and its organization were
the model upon which the local Christian churches were at the first constructed The Christian community grew for twenty years on the
unchallenged presupposition that a Gentile who would become a Christian had first to become a Jew. The Christians had no other thought than that
their new faith was the fulfillment and glorification of Israel’s faith. Their minds were furnished with no other concepts than those which they
received by virtue of their membership in the community of Israel. All the unique experiences and events to which they bore witness-the life,
death and resurrection of Jesus-occurred within the context of Judaism. They could not have occurred anywhere else. And they were interpreted and proclaimed as primarily relevant to Israel. These events and experiences were regarded as the fulfillment of prophecy, and prophecy was not merely the vision of individual seers, but the communal expectations of Israel itself whom God had chosen for the realization
of his purpose in history. . . .

“Moreover, the entire conceptual consciousness of Christianity took form within the Jewish community. The great structural ideas of Christianity were received from Judaism. They did not originate with Jesus or with his followers. The conception of one God, Creator of the world, Father of mankind, whose character is morally righteous; the conception of the world as itself good; the conception of the dignity of man as a child of God; made in the image of the Creator, enjoying companionship and partnership with the living and working God; the conception of the absolute sovereignty of God, and its correlate, the creatureliness of man; the conception of the equality of men in a communal brotherhood; the conception of evil as sin against God, and of divine grace available for the humble and contrite spirit; the conception of the active concern of God for the redemption of man through reconciliation with himself-these are some of the basic conceptions which constitute the characteristic ideology of the Christian Community and they were all received from Judaism.”
“What is Christianity” by C.C. Morrison, pp. 96-98.

Remember what those revelations say. Things like the only true and living Chruch upon the face of the whole earth. In the ordinances is the power of godliness manifest, without this no man can be in Gods presence and live. The dead without us cannot be made perfect. Hence baptisms for the dead.

Clear direction is given. Ample provision is made. There is no need to go soft on the ordinances.

I really found your post quite interesting. As a Jew I was completely unaware of the LDS perspective on the Jewish people and I appreciate your insight. However, at the risk of sounding aloof (which is not my intention), as a people, it really isn’t a concern to the Jews whether other religious communities believe we need to find salvation through conversion. As part of our fundamenatl religious doctrine, we don’t believe that we (or mankind in general) are “fallen” or need to be saved. We believe that our covenant with God is forever (as long as we continue to honor it) and, therefore, have no need to form new covenants along the way. In fact, to do so would be a violation of our covenant with God. Rather than sinners who must find redemption, Jews believe that we are fully worthy partners in God’s work and that his task for us is to repair/complete the world through good works, righteous living, and honoring God’s law–a concept known as tikkun olam. I bring this up only to say that, ultimately, whatever the LDS Church or other religious communities believe about the status of the Jewish people in God’s eyes really doesn’t matter to Jews themselves; we simply have a very different paradigm in our understanding of our relationship with God.

As for the Passover matzoh, I can assure you no blood is used- just cardboard.