Referenced Messianic Jewish Review Blog

The official blog of the Referenced Messianic Jewish Review. The Referenced Messianic Jewish Review studies the history, composition and theology of the Messianic Jewish movement.

Friday, April 06, 2012

Jesus in Matzah?

I have seen a number of Messianic congregations/leaders claim that Jesus is symbolized in how the Matzah appears. They claim that matzah is striped because Jesus was striped and that the matzah's holes are like the holes from Jesus on the cross. However, this makes no real sense. The only matzah that has stripes are those that are machine-made. The stripes are a by-product of the machine with no real meaning. Traditional hand-made matzah has no stripes. As for the holes, they are put in so the matzah does not balloon up when being cooked. It has nothing to do with Jesus.
Further, I have seen Messianics try to tie Jesus to the middle matzah. They claim that the middle matzah is broken, part of it is hidden as the afikomen and later the two parts are put together as a whole. This is supposed to symbolize how Jesus was a sacrifice without broken bones. Ignoring for a second that humans are not Biblically-permissible as sacrifices, the middle matzah is never put back together. The part which is kept at the table is eaten with the rest of the matzah at the seder meal. The idea of putting it back together simply is a creation of the Messianic movement.
Jesus ultimately has not ties to the matzah or to the meaning of Passover.

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