Anti-Semitism Before Christianity

(The following is the Response given by Alan Lazerte, Executive Director of "Canadian Friends of the International Christian Embassy, Jerusalem" to the prior contribution of Professor William Nicolls,author of "Christian Anti-Semitism: A History of Hate", both given at a FORUM ON ANTI-SEMITISM June 21st,1993 in Vancouver, B.C.,Canada.
The essence of Prof. Nicoll's thesis was that Christianity for the most part is a "myth"; and that it spawned the hatred of the Jews.)

What should Christians do about this diabolical plot, whatever its source? I think that one of the things we could do is honestly go back to some of our Jewish roots, not just biblical roots, but historical as well. The Jewish people have Yom Shoah, the Day of the Holocaust, an annual day in which they remember that period of inhumane horror. They also remember Krystl Night; the anniversary of the Nazi opening assault upon the Jews in Germany.

It would be entirely appropriate for Christian churches to have special services on some of these horrible days of Jewish remembrance; and to use those services for teaching, repentance and prayer and possibly even for inviting local rabbis and people to gently join us for some expression of our regrets. Next to that, I think what we need to do (it is not a bandage situation, it is like cancer in its advanced stages - we don't know how much time we have for a healing in this world at the rate it is moving) is finish the Reformation which Martin Luther began ! By which I mean casting off Christian doctrines and culture which put an unjustified burden of guilt on the Jewish people after the crucifixion.

We need to re-examine the faith of Jesus; and return to "this same Jesus who shall come again in like manner"; a Jesus who was thoroughly Jewish. But which Jesus do we examine for His Jewishness...the academic "historical Jesus" who was merely a man, perhaps even a Pharisee whose ideas were not in conflict at all with Old Testament Judaism, and who never thought of himself as the Messiah; or rather to the resurrected Jesus, and the concepts of the apostle Paul who only met Jesus after the resurrection and ascension?

Perhaps because Professor Nicholls ran out of time, he didn't enlarge upon his thesis that the New Testament presents a myth of salvation...that Jesus was merely a man and couldn't atone for the sins of anyone in the sense of "God being in Christ reconciling the world to Himself"? So Professor Nicolls would have us go back to the historical Jesus whom scholars like himself have been researching for the past hundred years. The Professor's thesis, as I read and understood it, and I did that quite carefully, is that the anti-Semitism in the world today stems from Christianity. I take issue with that position.

Anti-Semitism began with the call of Abraham. When God cut the covenant with Abraham the fowls of the air, (symbolically representing spiritual evil), descended upon the carcasses before God walked through as a fire. Ever since then, those forces of evil have been after the Jewish people whether it be in religious, or spiritual, or economic or other garb. For instance, Sarah nearly became a resident of two Egyptian harems. Who was behind that? If the plot had succeeded, there would never have been an Isaac.

The Pharaohs said on more than one occasion, "Kill all the males!" If that had happened there would not have been a Moses nor a Jesus. Ishmael, the child of the flesh, mocked Isaac and Sarah. Essau rejected his birthright and was against Jacob whose name was changed to Israel. Out of Essau, that man of the flesh opposed to God's plans, and oppossed to the choice of Jacob the supplanter (and God can deal with a repentant supplanter), there came Amilech, Agag and Haman of the book of Esther. Were any of these Christians? No! But they were all raging anti-Semites dedicated to the destruction and the annihilation of the Jewish people to prevent God's purpose of redeeming mankind from being fulfilled; the Covenants and Promises set out in Old Testament Hebrew prophecy.

Who was Antiocchus Ephiphanies IV who 135 years before the time of Christ came down from Syria and destroyed the Jews and set-up the pagan idols; intending to eradicate Jews and Judaism from the earth?. And then Herod himself was half Idumean, meaning he was also a descendant of Essau. Was the Roman Titus who destroyed the second temple in 70 A.D. a Christian? No! Was Hadrian who in the second century about 135 A.D. putting down the Bar Kockba revolt a Christian? No! So it is clear that according to Jewish Scriptures the source of anti-Semitism is not even human, but evil, invisable and diabolical ...beyond scientific observable analysis.

The New Testament itself it not inherently anti-Semitic, and I am a living proof of that because before I became a Christian (and by the way no one is born one, you can only be reborn one) in 1972 I was an anti-Semite. You might say, "How much of an anti-Semite?" I had been raised in Alberta. I was quite indoctrinated in political anti-Semitism. The original Social Credit movement,which came out of the economic theories of Major Douglas of the U.K., was thoroughly anti-semitic; and based on a Depression philosophy of " fifty big shots who controlled the world with a fountain pen"...and you can soon guess who the fifty were...not Gentiles.

I travelled around Canada with two of Canada's top anti-Semites, Ron Gostick of Ontario, and Patrick Walsh of Quebec, speaking in church basements on my time-off as a lawyer; believing in the Jewish conspiracy. However on August 8th, 1972, in the midst of a personal tragedy much of my own making I ,by the grace of God, saw that I was the problem (not someone else); and I bowed my knees to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and cried out, "God if you are there help me!." and something began to happen.. As I read the New Testament and in particular the Apostle Paul and the book of Romans, (being of a legal bent and a legal mind myself), the lights began to go on. "The entrance of Your Word, O LORD, bringeth light." By the time I finished the New Testament (which is supposedly so anti-Semitic), I had ceased to be one. I had been cleansed by the Spirit of God, Who dictated those Scriptures through the minds of men.

The New Testament as written is not anti-Semitic.In fact, compared to what the Old Testament prophets had to say to unbelieving Israel, the New Testamant speaks only against the apostate political and religious Jewish leaders of that day! However, much Christian theology has been and is anti-Semitic and I believe the culprit is theology. Theology is what man thinks of God and that frankly isn't the issue. For instance, theologians and the anti-Semites of this world like to quote the cry of the mob before Pilate: "His blood be on us and our children forever." But whose cry did God hear and remember; the cry of that mob, or the cry of Jesus Christ on the cross, His last words in the flesh, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do"? The "they" not being only Jews, but Jews and Gentiles as stated elsewhere clearly in the book of Acts that the Jews and Gentiles together, that the sin of humanity in effect, crucified Jesus of Nazareth.

If Jesus Christ were to come into this world today in the flesh, the same as He did previously, He would again be crucified by this wicked world because His righteousness would inflame them to hatred and jealousy. The theologians concocted "Deicide", the thought that man killed God. That is not even sound theology because Jesus said, "No one takes My life from Me; I lay it down and I take it up again." No. Sin, the power of evil, what Judaism calls the "evil impulse", crucified "the Lord of Glory". In the Christian revelation Sin is more than an evil impulse; it is an evil inherent in fallen human nature; a cancer that can only be removed by our human nature being reunited with the Spirit of God. (See John Chapter 3)

Most theologians allege that the Abrahamic covenant is no longer relevant. If the Abrahamic covenant is gone (which promised the land of Palestine to the Jewish people as an everlasting possession),how did the Jewish people survive, and why are the Jewish people back in Palestine today in spite of all their enemies ? It is true they were under chastisement by God for centuries, and when you are standing on the seashore there is no way you can stop that tide from going out. But when the time comes, and that tide reverses, you can't stop it from coming in either. As Psalm 102 declares: "the set time has come to favour Zion", and "when the Lord builds up Zion he shall appear in his glory" (not in his humilation)

The nations of this world, and through the United Nations and through other power blocks, constantly malign Israel and speak of her having no right to be there, but they will not stop what God is doing. He will keep His covenant and many more of them will be soon coming home. (See Psalm 89 concerning the Covenant; and Jeremiah 16: 14-16 concerning the fulfillment)

We have had centuries of the teaching of contempt for the Jewish people:. : Oragon, St. Augustine and many others. But the truth is that Christian leaders and teachers did not pay attention to the whole of the Bible. They, and most of us, have relegated chapters 9, 10, and 11 of the book of Romans to the scrap heap. We might as well have taken razor blades and cut it out of our Bibles for the amount of attention we have paid to it. Yet in those three chapters Paul tells us that most assuredly it is morally impossible for God to turn against Israel. He also tells us, and told the Church, in no uncertain terms, that the Jewish people would be the enemies of our Gospel message (that Jesus is Messiah) "until the fullness of the Gentiles come in". (Romans Chapter 11)

Because we were unable intellectually to understand that, we failed to submit ourselves to the Word of God, and set ourselves about (as many churches did throughout history) to force the Jews to convert...to come to Christ or swallow a sword, or die, or be burned at the stake. My suggestion is that the assignment of the Church in this world is to preach the Gospel and let the Spirit of God do the convincing.

So. we do have historical anti-Semitism; but I presume that nearly everyone would condemn it wholeheartedly.

To draw an analogy, if Professor Nicholl's book were written about the moon it would be the dark side of the moon. But there is a bright side, and a light, and an enrichment side to Christianity. It has saved my otherwise condemned, dark, helpless, hopeless soul, and I thank God for that through Jesus Christ. As Paul asked: "Who will deliver me from this body of death"? I answer with him: "Thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Romans 7:24,25)

Further, not all Christians have been anti-Semites. The Dutch people, the Danes,the French Huguenots and many others who knew and believed their Scriptures were not deceived by the Nazis and others like them!

Theodore Herzl in 1897 had a Christian advisor named William Hechler. Hechler was one of us; a Christian Zionist, and one of the top advisors to Herzl; and even opened many diplomatic doors for him and arranged meetings with Wilhelm Kaiser of Germany, etc. Then in 1917 that great year of the Balfour Declaration, almost the whole government of Britain at cabinet level were born-again Christians. The Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, was himself a born-again Christian. Balfour himself was a born-again Christian. The year 1917 saw the liberation of Jerusalem from four hundred years of Turkish rule by another Christian Zionist named General Allanby whose very name scared the Turks, because in Arabic his name meant "prophet of God." We also had President Harry Truman who was head of the first western nation to recognize the State of Israel. While his Ambassador was explaining at the U.N. why the U.S. couldn't recognize Israel, Truman was doing so on the radio. Truman was raised Methodist, and knew his Bible. He even said later "I am the modern Cyrus"! (It was the Persian Cyrus who let the Jews go back to Jerusalem after the first Captivity).

We have the holocaust years, but hatred of Jews in Europe did not start in World War II. Hatred of Jews and Christianity and Scriptures moved into high gear with so-called "higher biblical criticism" in the 1800s in Germany. It was those arrogant, ungodly, unbelieving academics that led Germany into unbelief and the hell of German anti-Semitism. It is a spiritual trueism that if you reject the Light, you get the Darkness! And further,that a nation that was once godly invites God's wrath when it turns from truth to lies. (Jeremiah 18:7-10)

The spiritual decline manifested before World War I, on the basis of scientific hatred of Jews through the racial theories of Darwin, and its application to the myth of National salvation. Even before World War I there was in Germany the Faith Movement of German Christians with the emphasis on Aryan supremacy.. Hitler wrote Mien Kampf in 1923. He became the Chancellor of Germany of January 30th, 1933.

Two days later, Deitrich Bonhoffer ( who paid for it with his life) was on the radio questioning and denouncing the Nazi heresy, and the need for a Fueher in Germany. Even before he finished his speech his microphone was turned off. A great struggle began in Germany when Hitler became Chancellor. It was a great Church struggle.

In July 1933 Hitler created a new church in Germany; the "only" church; the German church; the anti-Jewish church. In September 1933, Martin Niemollar began the "Pastors Emergency League", and seven thousand out of seventeen thousand Protestant pastors in Germany signed up. In January 1934, Hitler issued a muzzling order on the pastors in all the churches and they were forbidden to discuss controversial matters.

However, In May of 1934, in an area called Barmen, Germany,Bonhoffer, Niemollar and others formed a new German Evangelical Church claiming that they were the only official representatives of Jesus Christ in the German Protestant world; and that Barmen Declaration is something to which we should pay attention today.

Article 2 specifically repudiated all forms of anti-Semitism and hatred of Jews and intolerance thereof. In June of 1936, three years before the War began, this organization of Protestant pastors sent a memo to Hitler: "A memorandum sent to Hitler in June 1936 condemns anti-Semitism, concentration camps, police powers exempt from judicial control, the oath of the Hitler Youth, and an official morality of sheer expediency and power."

Hitler could not cope with this true evangelical Church. He wrote in his diary that he would get the Jews during the war and he would get the Christians after the war. It is time that we Christians and Jews realize that sometimes we are drawn together. Some of the rabbis in Europe were in concentration camps with the pastors in Europe and there they found that the Jewishness of Jesus made them both the common enemy of the Nazis, and that they both had a common enemy in the Nazis. That statement is true today of Islam where Jews and Christians are both the enemies of Islam. You won't read much about it in your newspaper. You may have heard a little about starvation in Sudan, but did you know that the Islamic government of Sudan has driven thousands of black Christians into the desert to starve to death or die of thirst unless they convert to Islam? Where are our Western journalists with their television cameras on that issue? Not to be seen!

We have another eyewitness to the great German Church struggle, from an unlikely source; Albert Einstein. He fled Germany in the late 1930s, but this is what he said. This confessing Church led by Bonhofferr, Niemollar and others...Albert Einstein said of that Church: "Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler's campaign for suppressing the truth. I am forced to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly."

There was a great church struggle. We could perhaps summarize it up best by Karl Barth's, the Swiss theologian, assessment of the confessing Church in Germany when he said this: " In 1933 and the years immediately following, at the time the National Socialists seized power, there was no struggle of the German universities and schools, nor of the German legal profession, nor of German business, nor of the German theatre or German art in general, nor of the German army, nor of the German trade unions. Many individuals it is true went down to an honourable defeat, but in no time at all those large groups and institutions were subdued and made to conform by the Secret Police. On the other hand from the very first month on, there was a gigantic German church struggle. If at least as much was done in other areas as was done at the time by the confessing Church, National Socialism would have had a hard time of it in Germany from the start. In proportion to its task, the church has sufficient reason to be ashamed that it did not do more, yet in comparison to those other groups and institutions, it has no reason to be ashamed. It accomplished far more than all the rest put together."

Yet we have the problem of anti-Semitism. Before I knew of this book or knew of the existence of the professor or he of me, in my monthly newsletter called Israel Report, I in January and February 1996 wrote two articles. The first was called "Repentance Not To Be Repented Of" and in that I pointed out the truth of what a rabbi in Toronto said in his book. "The holocaust was a Jewish problem. It is now a Christian problem" My article pointed out that the whole credibility of Christianity for those outside the faith is put in serious, serious doubt by Christian anti-Semitism. My second article was the failure of the Church, and we have to say mostly establishment leadership, to put this on the front burner of the Church agenda, and that this failure is having serious repercussions. My third article published two weeks ago dealt with the rebirth of the State of Israel. The reason, in my opinion, that most churches are not seeing that the reappearance of the State of Israel is a statement by God that He Himself has not deserted the Jews is for theological reasons.

We don't have to rewrite the New Testament, as some including perhaps the professor think. We don't have to abandon our Jewish roots because there can be no true Christianity without our Jewish roots. That is where the richness is in the olive tree, and I have found it to be so in my years of research and association with Christians who nurish, not eradicate, the Jewish roots of our faith!.

What we have to do is clean up our theology; and I urge the leaders that are here present to get about our Father's urgent business as Jesus said: "In that you do these things to the least of them, one of My brethren, you have done it unto Me."

Please also see The Church's Struggle with the Third Reich

This article also appears as ANTI-SEMITISM FORUM