Arnold Fruchtenbaum

Arnold G. Fruchtenbaum (born September 26, 1943 in Tobolsk , Siberia , as Aritschek Genekowitsch Fruchtenbaum ) is an American theologian and author.

Life

Fruchtenbaum's father Henry (Chaim) Fruchtenbaum had fled from Pultusk as a Polish Jew from the Germans to the USSR . There he was falsely accused of being a Nazi spy and interned for two years. He then worked as a photographer in Tobolsk, Siberia. After the Second World War he returned to Poland with his wife and child. Because of Polish anti-Judaism in the post-war period, they fled with many other Jews and with the help of the Zionist underground movement Bricha on foot via Czechoslovakia and Austria to Germany. As Displaced Persons they were placed in a British refugee camp near Ulm , but were unable to emigrate to Israel as desired . In Ulm, Fruchtenbaum was instructed by his father in the Tanach and the Orthodox Judaism of his ancestors before the family could emigrate to Brooklyn in New York City in 1951 .

While in Ulm, the family made the acquaintance of the Protestant clergyman Theophil Burgstahler. This ultimately led Fruchtenbaum and his mother to the New York headquarters of the American Board of Missions to the Jews (ABMJ). Five years later, Fruchtenbaum accepted Jesus as Messiah . His father was a strong opponent of this belief, and when the family moved to Los Angeles in 1958, he forbade his son from reading the Bible, attending Christian gatherings and Christian-Jewish groups. Under these difficult circumstances, Arnold Fruchtenbaum still managed to stay in contact with Jewish believers and to adhere to the Christian faith. When he graduated from high school, his father forced him to leave home because of his beliefs.

In 1962 he began to study at Shelton College in New Jersey , but later moved to Ohio's Cedar College and graduated in 1966 with a Bachelor of Arts in Hebrew and Greek. Then he went to Israel , where he took archeology , ancient history , historical geography and Hebrew at the American Institute of Holy Land Studies in Jerusalem . During this time he experienced the Six Day War of 1967.

Fruchtenbaum returned to the United States later that year and enrolled in the Dallas Theological Seminary for Hebrew and Old Testament subjects . At the same time he began working as a missionary for ABMJ (now Chosen People Ministries).

In 1968 Fruchtenbaum married Mary Ann Morrow, a graduate of Gordon College in Massachusetts . With her he moved to Jerusalem in 1971 with a master's degree in theology to work in the local church and to prepare young Israeli believers for Christian service.

For the next two years, Fruchtenbaum worked for ABMJ at its New Jersey headquarters as the editor of The Chosen People . In 1976 he joined the staff of the Christian Jew Foundation in San Antonio as Vice Director of the largest Hebrew Christian broadcaster in the world.

That summer, Fruchtenbaum also met with others in relation to the mission to the Jews to discuss the problems of discipleship and the need for intensive biblical and theological training for Jewish believers, which laid the early foundation for Ariel Ministries . In December 1977 Ariel Ministries became a reality, Fruchtenbaum became director and press officer.

During his travels in Europe, Israel and the USA Fruchtenbaum came into very close contact with the messianic movement and its various forms and problems. His dissertation Israelology: The Missing Link in Systematic Theology was the return on 13 years of research, for 1989, he from New York University to Ph D., received.

Teaching

Fruchtenbaum is the author of numerous studies on the Bible that arouse interest from both Jews and (non-Jewish) Christians. In his Handbook of Biblical Prophecy , he advocates the principles of double election, repetition and context, and the historical-prophetic method of interpretation . He assigns the seven letters in the Revelation of John to certain periods of church history .

Publications (selection)

• Hebrew Christianity: its theology, history, and philosophy. Canon Press, Washington 1974, ISBN 978-0-913686-11-9 .
• Jesus was a Jew. Broadman Press, Nashville 1974, ISBN 978-0-8054-6209-8 .
• Handbook of Biblical Prophecy. Schulte + Gerth , Asslar 1984, ISBN 978-3-87739-374-1 .
• Israelology: the missing link in systematic theology. Ariel Ministries, Tustin, CA 1989, ISBN 978-0-914863-05-2 .
• Messianic Christology: a study of Old Testament prophecy concerning the first coming of the Messiah. Ariel Ministries, Tustin, CA, 1998, ISBN 978-0-914863-07-6 .
• The life of the Messiah . Christian Media Service, Hünfeld 2008, ISBN 978-3-939833-05-5 .
• The Letter to the Hebrews : an interpretation from a messianic-Jewish perspective. Christian Media Service, Hünfeld 2008, ISBN 978-3-939833-50-5 .
• Law and legalism. Christian Media Service, Hünfeld 2010, ISBN 978-3-939833-25-3 .
• Messianic Christology . Christian Media Service, Hünfeld 2011, ISBN 978-3-939833-38-3 .
• The Song of Songs . A biblical concept of love. Christian Media Service, Hünfeld 2011, ISBN 978-3-939833-32-1
• The feasts of Israel and their significance for the New Testament congregation (translated by Manfred Künstler), Christlicher Mediendienst, Hünfeld 2011, ISBN 978-3-939833-37-6 .
• JESCHUA - The life of the Messiah from a messianic-Jewish perspective , Christlicher Mediendienst, Hünfeld 2019, ISBN 978-3-961900-49-7 .

Web links

• Homepage of Ariel Ministries
• Literature by and about Arnold Fruchtenbaum in the bibliographic database WorldCat
• Literature by and about Arnold Fruchtenbaum in the catalog of the German National Library