WHEN DID THE MESSAGE OF "LOVE" TURN TO "HATE"

WHEN DID THE MESSAGE OF “LOVE” TURN TO “HATE?”

Hugh Fogelman

The authors of the Christian bible―the New Testament―and other Christian writers have become hallowed with the passage of the centuries. Over time, many New Testament believers ― Christoholics ― have come to take every word literally. The term “gospel” has come to mean absolute truth, instead of originally, “good news.”

No matter how illogical some happenings and translations are, most Christian accept them at face value. Even when the passages contradict the love ethic, which Christians staunchly maintain is the hallmark of their bible, many see no discrepancy. They turn a blind eye to how their bible portrays the Jews.

For example, most Christians have not been bothered by the division between the command to love their neighbors as themselves and the incitement to kill them (Luke 19:27) if they do not follow Christian religious beliefs. In the past it was enough for the faithful to tell themselves that theirs was the religion of love and they had Christian love in their hearts―even as they went forth to burn, loot and murder; wiping out entire Jewish villages, killing Muslims in crusade after crusade or burning witches at the stake.

For people to overcome their blind acceptance of such contradictions, they must first divest the unknown Christian authors of the aura of perfection or infallibility. Unfortunately people want to think of those elevated to sainthood, as above pettiness and jealousy and certainly beyond distortion of a bible text.

If Christians are ever to read their bible without a feeling of animosity toward Jews welling up in them, they must be aware of the personal prejudices, human short comings, bias, and fallibility of its unknown authors. Hopefully the prejudicial attitudes of a religion cannot be masked forever, especially from the educated and fair-minded.

Can these same messages of hate now turn back to love? Indifference leads to silence. There must always remain the records of past and present cruelties done in the world, so that each generation can remember.

One of the most encouraging developments of recent years has been the closer relationship between New Testament believers and Jews. After centuries of tragedy, deep misunderstanding and Church lead persecutions of Jewish people which remain beyond adequate description or understanding, new appreciations of common roots and shared convictions about social justice and religious freedom have been identified. The Vatican, Pope John Paul II, some Catholic and Protestant Churches have acknowledged and sought to repent of their role in the sad history of murder and persecution by Christianity.

The Holocaust catastrophe belongs to the world. All humanity participated in one form or another. While Jews and others were murdered, New Testament believers possible thinking that the Jews deserved what they got because of allegedly killing Jesus, looked away. Pope John Paul II said, “This (anti-Semitism) contributed to soothing consciences, so that when Europe unleashed a wave of persecutions inspired by a pagan anti-Semitism―the spiritual resistance of many was not that which humanity expected from the Disciples of Christ.”

Slowly the priests and pastors are realizing how their anti-Semitic messages, when they read the gospels, affect their members. The Deans of Westminster and St. Paul, Bishop Harries of Oxford, and Krister Stendahl were preaching during the Lenten Season on the Holocaust on Good Friday and pointed out (Holy Week Preaching, Fortress Press, pp. 9ff) that “we must uproot every possible plant of anti-Semitism from our celebration of Holy Week―the suffering that New Testament believers have piled up on the Jews―our celebration of Holy Week must be one of repentance. The Lenten season precedes “Yom Ha-Shoah” (the Hebrew words for the remembrance of the Holocaust), and the themes of pain, suffering and repentance are enunciated in it.”

In 1979, Pope John Paul II said to Jewish organizations that Jews and Christians are “linked together at the very level of their identity.” When people are closely related, they cannot remain ignorant of or uncaring about one another.

Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, Archbishop of Chicago, wrote “While we cannot undo the past, we need not and must not repeat it, (referring to the Holocaust). As Jews and New Testament believers, we must remember it in such a way that the memory shapes our common future in which God and his purposes shall be our sole guide and inspiration.”

Building on this, Dr. Richard Harries (former Dean of King's College in London and now Bishop of Oxford) suggests that Passion Sunday should be the regular observance of the Holocaust in the Church liturgy. The task of remembering the Holocaust and of healing wounds and striving for reconciliation, can give new meaning to Passion Sunday.

Can anti-Semitism be stopped? It is all up to the pulpit!

"In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own." -Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

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