-Messianic Jewish Theologian-
Rabbi Mark S. Kinzer, Ph.D.
BIOGRAPHY
Dr. Mark S. Kinzer is Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation Zera Avraham in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Born in Detroit in 1952, Mark was raised in a Conservative Jewish home and became an adherent of Messiah Yeshua in 1971. He attended the University of Michigan (B.A., M.A., Ph.D.), and remains forever a loyal Wolverine, receiving his PhD in Near Eastern Studies in 1995. Kinzer received his rabbinical ordination from the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations in 2001.
The pre-eminent Messianic Jewish theologian, Mark is Senior Scholar and President Emeritus of Messianic Jewish Theological Institute, a graduate school preparing leaders for service in the Messianic Jewish movement. He is the founding moderator of Yachad BeYeshua, an international interconfessional fellowship of Jewish disciples of Yeshua and a founding member of the Society for Post-Supersessionist Theology.
Dr. Kinzer served on the Theology Committee of the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations (UMJC), and was a member of the subcommittees which drafted the UMJC’s Defining Messianic Judaism document (2005) and the revised UMJC Statement of Faith (2012).
One of the founders in 1997 of Hashivenu, a forum for advancing theological discussion in the Messianic Jewish movement, Dr. Kinzer has served as its Chair since 2000.
Dr. Kinzer was one of the founding rabbis of the Messianic Jewish Rabbinical Council (MJRC), and as the first Chair of the MJRC Faith and Halakhic Standards Committee edited the original version of the MJRC Standards of Observance.
Richard Mouw, former President of Fuller Theological Seminary, has called Dr. Kinzer “a breakthrough thinker who has taken Messianic Judaism to a new level of theological sophistication.” R. Kendall Soulen of Wesley Theological Seminary states that Dr. Kinzer is “widely regarded as the [Messianic Jewish] movement’s foremost theologian.”
Dr. Kinzer lives with his wife, Roslyn, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he also serves as Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation Zera Avraham, a Messianic Jewish synagogue which he founded in 1993.
Photo
Gallery
At a talk with a small community near Austin, TX called "Christ the Reconciler" where I was invited to speak on August 26, 2018.