[I have decided to include in every issue of Shma Minah a brief article about something controversial in Jewish thought today. Enjoy! And please send back your responses!]

I have been privy to multiple discussions concerning whether Jews should refer to the Christian Bible, meaning the apocryphal books included in the Christian canon, as the “New Testament” or not. Understandably, the implication is that “new” outdoes “old”, that the New Testament supersedes that of the Hebrew Bible. This distinction can be seen more clearly in the Hebrew translation of “New Testament”, “ברית החדשה”, the “New Covenant”. As opposed to a testament, a declaration or witness account to an event, a covenant is a union, in this context a replacement, of the older covenant God had with the Jewish people prior to the “first coming” of Jesus. I would like to explore if it is necessary to avoid calling the Christian Bible the “New Testament” or not.

Although I, too, would prefer the Christian Bible to be renamed “An Alternative Covenant”, or something ridiculously politically correct like that, I realize that this is not a realistic possibility. More importantly, there is, to me, no problem with referring to the Christian Bible as the New Testament. For one thing, it is a rather obvious fact that the books included in the Christian Bible are chronologically newer compositions than those of the Hebrew Bible; therefore, ספרי תנ”ך is a canon of “Older Testaments” than that of the Christian Bible. Also, although it certainly seems that Christian theology sees the followers of Jesus as the new “chosen people”, replacing God’s earlier covenant with the Jews, the Christian biblical works do not deny the earlier Jewish works. In other words, the Christian Bible includes the Old Testament, holding it to be sacred and Divinely inspired. If they believe it to be a precursor, a harbinger of Jesus’ arrival, this does not mean they dismiss the Hebrew Bible, but rather have a different understanding. They do not see the “Old Testament” as null and void, but rather Divinely reinterpreted.

Another point is the fact that “Old Testament” is a title, a reference to a series of books. However “loaded” a term it might be, it is nonetheless just a name. For example, if another book were to be called “Why Jews Are Bad”, I would not agree with the content, I would surely not name the book this title myself, and I might wish the author had changed the title. However, I would acknowledge and refer to the book with its proper title, its official name, since that is its name both officially and in common parlance.
I acknowledge and respect people’s personal sensitivities and understand if it is uncomfortable to call it by its given name. And yet particularly in academic settings, I see no reason why we should feel discomfort in calling a book by the name its believers’ have given it.

A note: This is different from calling Jesus “Jesus Christ”, a posthumous title like “Moshe Rabbeinu”, used exclusively by a particular religious constituency. Since “Christ” is not an official name or title, but rather a term of endearment given by Christian believers, I would easily object to Jews calling Jesus “Christ”, as it is a nickname meant to emphasize Jesus’ divinity, not a name his mother gave him.