I know that Barry believes that the Shroud is authentic, but he has never converted. An unusual case!
The answer to that question is simple ~ if God selected a Jew to bring the message, then he’s a Jew ~
For a jewish, largely secular scientist averse to Jesus being the messiah, it’s not really that unusual. Many jews can’t believe a god exists for allowing the holocaust to occur.
And of course just because you can’t explain something it doesn’t mean what we believe what happened is true. Just that science hasn’t figured it out yet. This reasoning somehow satisfies them with not having to decide one way or the other. The only faith they have is that someday, somehow, some way, “science will explain it”. Science doesn’t give the “why” to it, though, just the “what”.
He believes it is Authentic what?
The book of Judas is likely an authentic example of weird Gnostic writings.