Appendix

A1 Research Questions

The following questions unobtrusively guided the research between 1996 and 1999.

The relationship between the Messianic and their supernatural.

1. What beliefs hold Israeli Messianic Jews about the supernatural and the natural?
2. What do they think about God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit?
3. What supernatural experiences do they testify, and what does it mean to them?
4. How do they view the Holy Scriptures, Old and New Testament?
5. How do they view history, the physical world, time and space?
6. How do they experience the visible world, as creation?
7. How do they experience the visible world, as creation?
8. How do they experience salvation, Pesach of people, salvation of individuals?
9. How do they experience the continued activity of their God in time and space?
10. What do they expect from the immanent and transcendent future?
11. How do their beliefs relate to traditional Rabbinic, Christian, Muslim beliefs?
12. How do these beliefs shape their personal and social life?
13. How do they pray, free and spontaneous, or with a Siddur?
14. What Scriptures do they study (OT, NT, Siddur, Talmud, Midrash) and how?
15. Who is more active / passive, they or the supernatural (explorative - revelatory)?
16. What pattern is there in conversion stories?

The relationship of the Messianic within a Messianic Body.

1. How do they socially and organizationally structure their fellowship?
2. Are their fellowships structured like synagogues or evangelical congregations?
3. How evenly is power distributed within the fellowship?
4. Are their leaders holy Tzaddikim, employed pastors or volunteering brothers?
5. What may women do in the fellowships, what is reserved for man?
6. Do men and women worship in one room, undivided (De Vries 1968:17)?
7. What kind of specialists do they have, and how have they become what they are?
8. How can one become a member, by circumcision, baptism, conversion, tongues?
9. How can one loose membership, by ideological, ethical, moral deviation?
10. What Jewish habits, traditions, forms do they maintain, what abandon?
11. How homogenous / diverse are the groups?
12. Do their leaders have a common profile, charismatic, bureaucratic, intellectual...?
13. How autonomous are they regarding finances, personnel and culture (US)?
14. How do they make offsprings, educate converts, proselytes?
15. How, what and why do they communicate?

The relationship between different Messianic bodies.

1. How did each of them origin, how did they start, by whom, when and why?
2. Where are their theol. roots, Sephardim, Hasidism, Baptist, Brethren, Calvinist?
3. What are their particularities, subjects of discussion, disagreement and separation?
4. Are the differences personal, ideological, functional or structural?
5. Do boundaries change with generations and locations (Cohen 1985)?
6. How do borderlines run between and within them?
7. How do they cooperate, to what ends, how often, how long?
8. How, what and why do they communicate?
9. What do they together, what alone and why?

The relationship of the different bodies to the outside world.

1. Where do their adherents come from?
2. Who are the best friends, the fiercest enemies and why?
3. Are they internationally, interdenominational related, affiliated, connected?
4. How are they supported from abroad?
5. How do they view the Israeli upper-rabbinate?
6. Which groups are publicly accepted, which not?
7. How is their relationship to which Jews, Christians, Muslim, Palestinian?