I was born in 1862 at Berezna, a little town in eastern Hungary, where I was brought up in orthodox Judaism. The Jews there looked on Christianity as a phase of heathenism, for the Catholics openly exhibited their idolatrous habits, practices abhorred by the Jews because they were forbidden by Moses. Because of this, I was taught to avoid Gentiles, not even to take a drink of water from their vessels.
The Jews know nothing of Jesus Christ and His claims to the Messiahship. They do not connect the two names, but think of Christ simply as referring to the word “cross.” They do not know of His teachings or of the existence of a book called the New Testament.
At the age of seven, my father and mother died in the same year and left me to shift for myself as best I could. Thus I early learned to trust God and often prayed Him to teach me His ways. When thirteen years old, I decided to study to be a rabbi, the most honorable and meritorious life-office for a Jew.
At about eighteen years of age I was proficient in Hebrew literature and Talmudic law. I then received from several rabbis, in whose colleges I had studied, a diploma containing a certificate of my good character and acquirements and also authority to become a rabbi.
In a town nearby lived a wealthy Jew who consulted with one of these rabbis about taking me for his son-in-law, as he desired to marry his youngest daughter Rose to a rabbi. When consent was given, I was called, and arrangements were made. Our marriage was consummated in 1880. In the house of my father-in-law I was very happy, and always thanked God for giving me at last, after much hard labor in studying, so delightful a home. Many marks of honor were shown me, and I received tokens of love and kindness. The days I spent under my father-in-law’s roof were the brightest in my life. About a year after my marriage, my father-in-law died.
Very soon after my marriage, some people began to ask me questions as a rabbi, for they knew that I had attained to that position, but I refused to deal with them, as I lived near to my teacher in Sziget, and it is not lawful for a disciple to decide religious questions while his rabbi lives in the same district.
Several years later, when that rabbi died, I was called to practice my rabbinical duties in three congregations. For years they sought the law at my mouth. I decided among them all the different religious questions concerning worship, meat and milk, wine of libation, and the laws concerning slaughtering of animals. If two had a quarrel, they came to me and accepted my decision without further appeal, for such is the Jewish rule. I was both the lawyer and the judge. Every controversy was settled by my word.
During my leisure, I had frequent recourse to my Talmud, in which I at one time read the following: “The world is to stand six thousand years, vis., two thousand confusion and void, two thousand with the law, and two thousand the time of Messiah.” Rashi, the very first and most authoritative commentator gives as an explanation on the last clause: “Because after the second two thousand years, the Messiah must have come and the wicked kingdom should have been destroyed.” This greatly excited my attention. I was accustomed to sit on the ground almost every Thursday night at twelve o’clock, weeping, crying, and mourning for about an hour, over the destruction of Jerusalem and repeating Psalm 137.
I was very anxiously awaiting the coming of our Messiah, and now I saw that His time was over two thousand years ago, according to the Jewish reckoning. I was surprised, and asked myself, “Is it possible that the time which God had fixed for the appearance of our Messiah has passed away without the promise of our true and living God being fulfilled?” I never had had any doubt of the truthfulness of the Talmud; I believed every part of it to be holy, but now I looked upon this passage as a simple legend. It was then that I decided to search the Prophets concerning the time of the Messiah.
My first thought was to study Daniel, but I soon recollected that the Talmud curses one who studies concerning the end of the age, especially that part of Daniel which refers to the coming of the Messiah and the end of the times. “The bones of him who studies and calculates the ends” (meaning the time of the Messiah) “shall be blown up,” says the Talmud.
This sent terror into my heart and I thought that the minute I began to read that part of Daniel a thunderbolt would come down from heaven and strike me dead.
But another thought came, suggesting that those Talmudists who made such statements must themselves have studied Daniel and the other Scriptures concerning the coming of the Messiah, and if they did it, so would I. With fear and trembling, I opened the book, glanced over it, dwelling particularly on the ninth chapter. My research led me to blame myself for suspecting the holy words of the wise men. I could see only as through a glass, for I was totally ignorant of Jesus the Messiah, who was cut off but not for Himself. Therefore I could not understand thoroughly that the Messiah must have died for our sins. Yet I realized dimly that the Messiah must have come about four hundred years after Daniel was told by the angel about the seventy weeks.
There was gladness in my heart, to find it true that the Messiah should have come about that time, according to Daniel 9:24. But it was a joy mingled with sorrow. “Why has He not come?”
Dear reader, how you could have gladdened my sorrowful heart by giving me a New Testament, a book whose existence was utterly unknown to me at that time. I, therefore, continued to study the Prophets with greater zeal. While doing so, the pure spirit of God’s Word took hold of my mind and heart. I then discovered that much of the Talmudic law is contrary to the Word of God. Then what a great struggle within, between light and darkness! I used to go into my large garden, and under an apple tree cry like a little child, entreating, “Open Thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy law.”
A MEMORABLE FEAST
I could find no rest for my troubled soul. I asked a good many other rabbis about the Messiah and how they reconciled certain passages of the Talmud with the Word of God, but I received no satisfactory answer.
A little later, I was preaching, at that season, on a subject connected with the “Feast of Dedication.” I had not intended to tell anything publicly of what was so deep in my heart because of fear of persecution, but God, who causes the dumb to speak, opened my mouth, and I revealed unto them all my discoveries. Probably they would have believed the discovery about the Messiah, since we were all ignorant of the fact that such a disclosure related to the Crucified One, but when they heard me finding so much fault with the holy Talmud, that was quite enough to make them hiss and wag their heads at me, and finally to leave me alone, preaching to the empty benches. Bitter persecution followed.
START FOR AMERICA
I went to a distant town and consulted a noted rabbi, who looked at me in surprise and seemed to grasp the situation. I think he knew something about the Lord Jesus and His claims and did not want to discuss the matter, saying that if he thought and talked about the subject of the Messiah he would be discharged from his position. “But,” said he, “my advice is that you go to America. There you will meet plenty of people who will tell you more about the Messiah.”
So intent was I upon relieving my mind of this burden that I at once set sail for America, determined to find the Messiah at any cost. I did not even return to my home to inform my family that I was going.
About the middle of March 1892, I found myself in New York. My countrymen, many of whom knew me personally at home, others by name only, gave me the kindest reception, some even leaving their business to welcome me, when they heard of my arrival. I soon went to a rabbi of my own countrymen, to whom I had a letter of recommendation. He received me very kindly, offering me temporary service in his synagogue and promising to procure a congregation where I could be the rabbi. It was a busy time with the Jews, the time of preparation for the Passover.
DISCOVERIES IN NEW YORK
On the third Saturday after my arrival, I went out for a walk, thinking again about the Messiah. I passed by a church where there was a sign with Hebrew letters saying, “Meetings for Jews.” I stopped, became curious and desired to enter. At my first step toward the door, however, I saw a cross at the top of the building. I was puzzled, and began to reason, “If this is a Christian Church, what does that Hebrew writing mean? And what connection have they with the Jews? How can a Jew enter a building on which there is a cross, that object which the so-called Christians in my country worship? And how are the Jew and Christian, between whom there is such great hatred in my country, here united?”
As I stood musing and absorbed in these thoughts one of my friends passed by and said, “Mr. Cohn, you had better come away from there.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Just come, please,” said he, and was so persistent that I had to follow. We went a few steps when he said, “There are some apostates in that church who mislead our Jewish brethren.”
“How?” He made me only more anxious to know.
He told me at last. “They say that the Messiah has already come.” When I heard that, I was nearly bewildered with joy and surprise, for this confirmed my discovery. I longed to enter that church to hear their ideas, but how could I get rid of my companion? I had already taken a lesson in my country not to speak about such things, so I freed myself from him by saying, “Goodbye, friend, I have to go somewhere.”
Glancing back until convinced of his disappearance, I ran hastily into the church, notwithstanding the cross at the top. But alas! What a scene! The preacher on the platform, as well as the audience, all bareheaded! What a sin, especially for a rabbi to be bareheaded. I turned quickly and went out, but the janitor, noticing all this, gave me the address of the preacher.
MY FIRST NEW TESTAMENT
The following Monday, I called on the preacher and found him a Hebrew-Christian with a most interesting, winning way. He was educated in Talmudic literature and when he told me that he was a descendant of a certain well-known rabbi, he gained my confidence and love at once. Seeing my utter ignorance of the Christian faith, but also my great earnestness, he gave me a Hebrew New Testament, asking me to read it. I opened it at once and read for the first time in my life: “This is a book of the generation of Yeshua, the Messiah, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham.”
My feelings could not be described! For many years my thoughts had been occupied almost continually with the coming of the Messiah. For that reason I had suffered and left my wife and children for a strange country, which I never expected to visit. I had inquired of several rabbis, searched the Scriptures, prayed and thought; my whole being was wrapped up in this one subject. And now at last here was a book that would tell me about the Messiah. “Surely,” I thought, “this book has come to me directly from above. God has sent it to me, and it will give all the desired information and lead me to the Messiah.” The words, “Yeshua, the Messiah, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham” were sweeter to me than angelic music.
I forgot all about my troubles and became very happy. I ran as fast as I could to my private room, the doors of which I locked behind me, and sat down to study that book. I began reading at eleven o’clock in the morning, and continued until after midnight. I could not understand the contents of the whole book, but I could at least realize that the Messiah’s name was Yeshua, that He was born in Bethlehem, that He had lived in Jerusalem and talked to my people, and that He came just about the time indicated by the angel’s message to Daniel. My joy was unbounded.
TRIALS BEGIN
In the morning, I ran quickly to my rabbi friend, who by that time had already a prospect of securing a rabbinical charge for me, and told him of the book and my discoveries. I had not identified this Yeshua, the Messiah, with the name Jesus; I did not see at that time that this Messiah is the same of whom gross caricatures had been presented in my country, neither could I think of Gentiles believing in the Jewish Messiah. Had that been the case, humanly speaking, I could not have been reconciled to that hated Crucified One. I thought that this Yeshua, the Messiah, must be somewhere ruling as the King, having His people, perhaps the lost ten tribes, as His subjects, and what happiness it would be for me to join them and to be under His rule! Such impossible dreams were in my heart, and when I suggested them to the rabbi, you can imagine what followed.
Vehemently and with terrible curses, he threw the book to the floor, stomped on it, and denounced me and said that that was the book which the Crucified One had made and it was the cause of all Jewish troubles. “And now,” he said, “a Jew like you should not handle that book, or talk, or think of it.”
I fled from his wrath with new struggles in my heart. “Is it possible that Yeshua, the Messiah, the Son of David, is the very same person whom the Christians worship? Why, that is idolatry! How can I have anything to do with that?” For several days my heart ached with sorrow and depression. Then I renewed my studies and began to see the truth more plainly, as the sufferings of the Messiah were revealed to me.
The fifty-third chapter of Isaiah was a most wonderful revelation, but what of it? How could I love that hated One? How could I take His name upon my lips since He is the Crucified One and since His followers in every generation and in every country have hated my people, robbed my brothers of all that was good, killed, tortured and degraded them? How could I, a true Jew, join myself to such a band of the enemies of my own flesh and blood? But a small voice seemed to whisper in my heart, “If He is the One of whom the Scriptures write, then you must love Him. No matter what others do in His name, you must do as He teaches.”
THE LIGHT DAWNS
Halting between two opinions, I decided to fast a day and pray to God to show me what to do. At noon time, when instead of eating I began to pray, I held in my hands the Hebrew Old Testament and as I cried to God my body shook and the book dropped to the floor and opened by itself. Opening my eyes, I looked down and to my great consternation, read from the open page in the Hebrew, Malachi 3:1, which says literally, “I am sending my messenger and he shall prepare the way before me and the Lord whom you seek shall suddenly come to His temple, even the angel of the covenant” (that word is identical with the word “testament”) “whom ye delight in: behold, He has already come, says the Lord of Hosts.”
I began to shiver; like an electric shock the words went through my whole system, and I felt as if the Crucified One stood beside me, pointing to that verse and particularly to the expression, “Behold, He has come already.” I was awe-stricken and fell on my face exclaiming with all my heart, “My Lord, my Messiah, Yeshua, Thou art the One in whom Israel is to be glorified. Thou art surely the One who has reconciled Thy people unto God. From this day, I will serve Thee.”
At that moment, a flood of light came into my mind and a stream of love to the Lord Jesus into my heart, and immediately I went and took a meal, breaking my fast and feeling altogether a new creature.
Due to extreme persecution, Leopold Cohn fled to Scotland. After a long delay, he was reunited with his wife and family. Within two years, they too had trusted the Lord. They were instrumental in starting several missions to Jews back in New York. Mrs. Cohn died in 1908, her husband in 1937. This article was excerpted from his autobiography, To an Ancient People, pp. 3-15.