During the week covered by this review, we received 17 articles on the following subjects:
Christian Zionism
Missionary Activity
Jewish-Christian Dialogue/Political Issues
Jewish-Christian Relations
Pope and the Vatican
Academia
Christian Tourism
Miscellaneous
Christian Zionism
The Jerusalem Post, March 10, 2013, The Jerusalem Post, March 12, 2013
Two articles reported on Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger’s speech delivered to a group of Christian leaders gathered in Jerusalem for the Christians for Israel bi-annual conference. Jeremy Sharon explains that “the five-day conference brings Christian leaders from around the world together to strategize with Israeli and Jewish counterparts to improve and maintain ongoing cooperation.” Michael Freund adds that “the group lobbies European parliamentarians in Brussels on Israel’s behalf, supports soup kitchens in places such as Beit Shemesh, assists Diaspora Jews to make aliya” as a way of atoning for “the treatment of the Jewish people by the Church over the centuries.” In his speech, Rabbi Metzger addressed Christians’ historical persecution of the Jews, adding “that the adoption of the Nostra Aetate by the Catholic Church in 1965, which repudiated the notion of Jewish guilt for the killing of Christ, had provided an important opportunity for reconciliation between the two faiths.” Metzger thanked those at the conference for their support, saying: “you are truly the sons of Abraham and our brothers . . . We are thankful for your support and help for us to fulfill the right to be citizens in the Holy Land.” He added a note of caution, however, telling the audience: “If you know of someone who wants to come here to try and convert Jews, tell them not to do it” since “proselytization efforts damage relations between Jews and Christians.”
Andrew Tucker, executive director of Christians for Israel, took the opportunity to read a declaration penned by the organization that reiterates “the group’s public backing of the Jewish state and denounc[es] recent criticism of Israel by several churches and Christian denominations.” It also rejects the notion of Replacement Theology, which Tucker said “has been heavily promoted by Palestinian Christian activists as part of the struggle against the State of Israel.”
In his article, Michael Freund reflects on how far Jewish-Christian relations have come in recent years. “Several centuries ago,” he writes, “a similar gathering of worldwide Christian leaders would surely have devoted its energies to finding new ways to harm the people of Israel. Nowadays, they come together to help.” Freund concludes by saying that he knows “that there are many Jews who are still skeptical about Christians and their intentions. And we certainly must be vigilant against those who seek to convert Jews . . . But we must also learn to differentiate between them and those who truly wish to forge bonds of amity and goodwill. Not all Christians are out to get us, and to suggest otherwise is simply fatuous and misleading.”
The Jerusalem Post, March 10, 2013
Judah Bellin examines the unusual form of Zionism adopted by eminent Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr in the earlier part of the 20th century. “Given the way intellectual fashions have turned against the Jewish state,” writes Bellin, “it is now very difficult to imagine a prominent liberal Christian theologian defending Zionism with anything like Niebuhr’s depth of passion.” The reason Niebuhr was able to do this is because he made a clear distinction between theology/religion and politics. “Niebuhr thought that the Christian religion provided a compelling account of man’s fallen nature and his inability to move past self-interest in his relationships with others, including his political relationships.” Indeed, “Niebuhr rejected the notion that God chose sides in political matters . . . Humans – imperfect, fallible creatures – could never act in perfect accordance with God’s wishes.” This is why Niebuhr was uncomfortable with Zionism’s religious dimensions which understood the Zionist project as “a fulfillment of a divine mandate.” Thus, “though Niebuhr sympathized with Israel as both a bastion of democracy and a worthy response to the intractable problem of anti-Semitism, his approach made no room for an ideology that claimed both to know and to embody God’s will . . . Though he recognized Israel’s creation as a significant accomplishment, he thought it was first and foremost a political accomplishment and that as such, the explicitly messianic dreams of some of its founders were ill-founded.”
Yediot Aharonot, March 12, 2013
A group of Israel-loving Christians from Norway has bestowed a gift of 60,000 ILS on former Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit as a way of acknowledging his suffering while being held hostage by Hamas. The group lobbied for Shalit’s release at the time of his captivity. Last year, the same organization granted a similar financial gift to Yad VaShem.
Yediot Aharonot, March 15, 2013
This four-page article reports on the current construction of a full-scale Temple in Brazil by the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God. The inspiration for the idea came to Archbishop Edir Marcedo (the church’s current leader) during a visit to the Holy Land, when he felt strongly that every Christian should visit the place where Jesus lived and died. “I thought, if I can’t bring all the believers to this place, then I will bring something of this land to the believers.”
Yediot Aharonot, March 15, 2013
This article focuses on American radio presenter Kevin McCullough who is currently visiting Israel. McCullough is known for his radical views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which he situates within a conservative Evangelical framework. Asked about the Palestinians living in the land, he says: “Let them move to Jordan. That’s where they belong. It’s a just solution. According to the New Testament, Jordan also belongs to Israel.”
Missionary Activity
HaShabat BeNetanya, March 8, 2013
This article is a follow-up to the article published last week that reported on the Central Charity Bank’s refusal of a donation of 100,000 ILS from the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews because the source of the gift is the Evangelical Christian community in the United States (see second Media Review for March). IFCJ was outraged by the article and submitted a response, which stated that they are “proud to be the leading organization in assisting those in need in Israel as well as Jews in the Diaspora. The Fund aids 160 local municipalities and over 400 organizations across the social spectrum . . . We have never heard of the organization mentioned in the previous article [the Central Charity Bank] and we most certainly never offered this organization any help . . . We do not force our help on those who do not want it.”
HaShabat BeNetnya decided to use Yad L’Achim’s archives to further investigate the issue, concluding that IFCJ was founded and is supported by “Israel-loving Christians (Evangelicals) who yearn for the peace of those who have settled in Zion. According to their belief, the Jews who are caring for this land must be supported and encouraged until their messiah returns and ensures that all the Jews are under the hegemony of Christianity.” The paper goes on to say that the goal of the Evangelical Christians is purely religious: “that the whole world will convert to Christianity and so prepare the way for that man’s second coming. So even if they are currently giving a helping hand, their motive is religious, one which categorically denounces Judaism.” It is for this reason that many rabbis have ruled that it is unlawful to receive financial help from IFCJ, even though it is a Jewish organization.
Jewish-Christian Dialogue/Political Issues
The Jerusalem Post, March 11, 2013
Natan Levy offers this seething critique of the Christian boycott of Israeli settlement goods, asking if it doesn’t seem odd “that such august bodies as the Church of Scotland, the Methodist Church, the Iona Christian Community, the Quakers and Christian Aid have all chosen to boycott one single issue on earth?” Most especially, notes Levy, in light of the fact that these organizations never took such drastic steps over issues such as “child slavery in the chocolate plantations of the Ivory coast in the early 2000s, nor the blood diamonds of 1990’s Angola. Not the Nestle infant formula scandal of the 1980’s,” even refusing to boycott Germany in the 1930’s “as it stripped the Jewish community of its rights and freedoms.”
Levy delves into the history of the current boycott, explaining how it originated in Latin America in the early 1970’s when Catholic priest, Father Gustavo Gutierrez, attempting to understand the social injustices procured by ostensibly Christian states, introduced the transformative concept of liberation theology, which claims that “Jesus’ redemptive call must be reinterpreted as the struggle for bread and justice, rather than spiritual blessings alone.” Social justice was thus turned into an act of Christian faith. “The problem,” writes Levy, “at least for the Jews, occurred when liberation theology became fashionable among the liberal churches in the west.” These churches made Jesus “stand out on the 1st century scene,” causing Judaism to be read as “a noxious mix of warlike theology, obsessive purity compulsions and clannish racism.” In other words, Judaism became “everything that Jesus could stand out against.” This, says Levy, is where the current boycott was born: “Here was the toxic combination: Liberal churches carried an intrinsically negative view of Judaism, while liberation theology demanded the Jesus’ message must be enacted in real-world change. The perfect storm for the Israel boycotts now required only a dovetailing of the liberation theology call to action.”
In the final part of his article, Levy claims that all these pieces came together in Reverend Naim Ateek, founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Centre in Jerusalem. In one of his Lenten homilies, Ateek expressed it thus: “In this season of Lent, it seems to many that Jesus is on the cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around Him.” Levy explains: “Once it had been ‘the Jews who had killed the Lord Jesus’ . . . now it was the Israeli government re-enacting the Passion daily on Palestinian children.” This is why, in 2009, when Rev. Ateek published a document calling on Christians to boycott Israel, the global church responded quickly, and the current boycott was born.
Jewish-Christian Relations
Maariv, March 13, 2013
The Vatican has made an unusual plea to Israel’s Chief of Police, asking that the security forces do more to protect Christians in Israel. The plea was issued after Catholic attempts to restore the holy site in the village of Nain had to be stopped on account of threats made by a local criminal family, causing the Catholic workers to flea for their lives. In the letter, the Vatican claimed that “Israel’s image is being severely damaged throughout the world and especially in the Vatican, where Israel comes across as a place where criminals have their way.”
Pope and the Vatican
Haaretz, March 12, 2013, The Jerusalem Post, March 13, 2013, Haaretz, The Jerusalem Post, March 15, 2013
Several leading papers reported on the election the new pope, Francis I, which took place this week at the Vatican. The general consensus in these articles is that Francis I is good for the Jews. According to Haaretz, Francis I is a known and beloved figure among the Jews of Buenos Aires. In fact, the newly elected pope has co-authored a book on inter-religious dialogue with one of Argentina’s chief rabbis. The Jerusalem Post reports that the day after his election, Pope Francis I reached out to Rome’s Jewish community, “saying he hoped he would be able to contribute to furthering good relations between Catholics and Jews.” One of the articles in The Jerusalem Post concludes thus: “Unlike John Paul II, who as a child had positive memories of the Jews of his native Poland but due to the Holocaust had no Jewish community to interact with in Poland as an adult, Pope Francis has maintained a sustained and very positive relationship with a living, breathing community in Buenos Aires. Judging from that positive relationship, his appointment appears to be good for both Catholics and Jews.”
Academia
The Jerusalem Post, March 13, 2013
In an unusual step, the Intel-Young Scientist competition awarded first prize to “a paper on Paul the Apostle that refutes his attempt to separate Judaism from Christianity and claims he was a Jew who tried to understand the new situation after Jesus.” The Jerusalem Post notes that “only rarely has a project on history won the top prize in the competition which is now in its 16th year.”
Christian Tourism
Maariv, March 15, 2013
This six-page article examines the growing phenomenon of unqualified tour guides leading groups in Israel, and the damage that their lack of knowledge (and prejudice) causes. This includes unqualified religious leaders (like pastors of Christian groups). The focus of the article is on the legal battle being waged against these guides by Israel’s qualified tour guides, who are demanding that it be made illegal for anyone to lead tours without the proper qualifications.
Miscellaneous
The Jerusalem Post, March 10, 2013
Clerics in Iran were angered by comments made by Iran’s Ahamdinejad who said that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will be resurrected with Jesus at the end of the age, together with “the hidden imam who Shi’ites believe will rise up to bring world peace.”