In his letter to the believers in Rome the olive tree is Paul’s chosen metaphor for the covenant family of the God of Israel. We have considered the metaphor itself, so now let us study more fully what Paul wrote in the letter.

A balanced understanding is of great importance here. As we discussed in the previous article, imbalance has contributed to replacement theology and its consequences. Imbalance of other kinds is possible too in our quest to understand the relationship between the Christian Church and Israel.

The God of Israel remembers his Covenant promises to Israel, but these promises are only fulfilled through faith in Jesus the Messiah (Yeshua HaMashiach). There is one way to salvation for both physical descendants of Israel and those called to faith from the Gentile world. This too must be kept in balance.

Romans 11: a picture of the Covenant family

Paul’s letter to the Romans has been held up as his theological masterpiece. In it, he sets down a comprehensive understanding of God’s Covenant community fully and finally revealed in Jesus. In Chapter 11 Paul explores the way God is drawing together his Covenant family from all nations. However, this chapter does not stand alone - we must consider it in relation to the previous chapters of Romans.

The key issue in Paul’s day was a new move of God, whereby Gentiles, through faith in the Son of God, were included in the Covenant family. Chapters 1 to 8 are used by Paul to bring understanding to what God has done through the New Covenant. In chapters 9 to 11, Paul then balances this focus on the Gentiles by exploring God’s continuing purposes for Israel.

In Romans 11, believing Jews and Gentiles are seen as branches of the same body. Paul shows that God had already called many Israelites to faith and also has plans to call others in the future.

The ongoing plan, according to the promises given to Abraham, is that through grace there will be some from every nation in that family and an ongoing inclusion of some from the Tribes of Israel.

God’s timing

Since the time of Jesus there has been a partial blindness on the nation of Israel regarding God’s purposes in and through Jesus the Messiah, yet God still has a plan and a purpose according to all that he has promised. Paul asks:

I say then, have they [Israel] stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles. Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness! (Rom 11:11-12)

Paul sees a door of opportunity for the Gentile world opened by God. He is clear that he has been called as an Apostle to the Gentiles, but the Gospel to the Gentiles is not at the expense for God’s ultimate plan for Israel.

Paul’s ongoing love and concern for his physical family, the biological descendants of Jacob (Israel), is also very clear.

Paul’s ongoing love and concern for his physical family, the biological descendants of Jacob (Israel), is also very clear. He looks forward to the time when God will restore believing branches of Israel to himself, and though branches were cut off like branches cut from a tree, they can be grafted in again.

Believing Gentiles join, not replace, an existing family

Those who have been brought from the Gentile world into the family of God must realise they were brought into an existing family, just as a branch is grafted into an olive tree. They must recognise fully what God has done by their inclusion and not think that they have become a new family. Rather, they are a new part of an old family.

Particularly, by knowing this they must not boast but be aware of their position. They must in all humility understand that God has ongoing plans for the Israel. An implication is that Christian branches can also be cut off unless they are drawing the true life of the olive tree and producing true fruit, becoming what the deep soil and nourishment of Covenant history intended them to be.

Application

When Paul first used the metaphor of the olive tree there were misconceptions about the relationship of the new Christians in Rome to the roots of their faith. This may have been the reason for the clear exposition in his letter to the Romans. Be that as it may, the letter has also been bound into our Bible as a teaching for all generations.

Despite this, however, there has been neglect of chapters 9-11 of Romans (even in some Bible schools), so that the tendency of Christians through the centuries has been to misunderstand the roots of their faith. As a result, issues like the following are often side-lined or poorly understood:

• The Middle Eastern background of Christianity: Christianity developed out of Israel at the time of Jesus, and was founded on the long history that had paved the way to the coming of the Messiah. God’s covenant was made with Abraham; this is the foundation for all who come to the Father through faith in Jesus the Messiah.
• The Hebraic roots of Christianity: The language of Israel was Hebrew and the culture was Hebraic. This context became the foundational setting for the Christian faith. To study the Hebraic nature in the background to Christianity one should study the cultural and historical settings of the patriarchs and the Israelites through Old Testament times, and also study the Hebrew language to gain insights into Hebraic thought processes.
• The influence of Greek culture on the Christian faith: The Gospel went out to the Gentile world in the framework of the Greek language. This encouraged the Hellenisation (Greek emphasis) of the Church and the infiltration of Greek philosophical ideas that in turn caused separation from the true roots of the faith. The more meaningful approach has always been to trace back the Hebraic background to better understand the Gospel message as an invitation to join the Covenant family of God.
• Paul’s Jewish background: Paul came from a Torah-based, Rabbinical community. One should look into both his biblical and cultural roots to see the background from which he conveyed his message to the Gentile world.
• The Gospel call: The Christian Church emerged from a pagan world, but the Gospel message came from the nation of Israel, which was where God had made himself known by revelation. The call was to join God’s Covenant people through faith in the Messiah, not to interpret the Gospel message into the practices of the pagan world.

For Study and Prayer

Read the entire Letter to the Romans and consider the balance of Paul’s message. How might we ensure that we have the balanced perspective on our place in the Covenant family of God?

Next time: We will consider how aspects of ancient Middle Eastern culture help us understand the background to the Bible.

These studies are developed from the course 'Christianity’s Relationship with Israel and the Jews', first prepared for Tishrei Bible School.

What has Christianity got to do with olive trees? Clifford Denton opens up this important metaphor from Romans 11, in this second installment of our series on Christianity's relationship with Israel and the Jews.

In Romans 11, the Apostle Paul uses the metaphor of an olive tree to teach about God's Covenant family. In the preceding chapters of the Book of Romans, so strong is Paul’s message about inclusion of believers from the Gentile world, that one might consider that the Christian Church has replaced Israel. Hence, from chapters 9 to 11 there is a re-balancing of the picture. This confirms the continuing place of the physical descendants of Israel in the Covenant purposes of God.

Replacement Theology

Replacement Theology is the term that is given to the view that Christians replaced Israel as God’s Covenant People. Replacement Theology teaches that the failure of Israel has resulted in their total rejection - so that God could make a fresh start on a New Covenant plan. This is very subtle and has contributed to the loss of the Church’s deeper identity and an unnecessary rift between Christians and Jews. A study of Romans 11, therefore, helps us in the quest to restore an understanding of the relationship between Israel and the Christian Church.

The Olive Tree in Scripture

The olive tree is a familiar sight in the Middle East and, because of its character, is a very appropriate symbol to teach us about God’s Covenant family.

The first mention of the olive tree is in Genesis 8:11, where a dove brought back an olive leaf to Noah as the floodwaters receded. There are also a number of times when the olive is mentioned as a tree cultivated for its fruit in the Land of Israel (eg Deut 8:8).

It is a tree that has many uses, both every day and sacramental. Olive wood is a hard wood used for construction and ornaments. It was also used for parts of the construction of the Temple of Solomon, and was one of the trees specified for the construction of a Sukkah (Tabernacle) at the Feast of Sukkot at the time of Ezra.

The olive tree is first used as a metaphor in Psalm 52, where David compares himself with it. Prosperity for Israel is often linked to the health of the olive and the goodness of its fruit. The fruitful olive is often used to indicate health and wealth, whether in relation to the family (eg Psalm 128), or to the nation of Judah (as in Jeremiah’s warning, see Jeremiah 11:16). It is an eschatological symbol (that is, a symbol of end-times significance) in Zechariah 4:3 and 11-12. All of these scriptures come before Paul’s the use of the metaphor in Romans 11.

The Olive Tree and God’s Covenant

By using the symbol of the olive tree in Romans 11, Paul shows that the destiny of the faithful of Israel and of the Gentile world is bound together. The Christian Church has emerged from the same background as the faithful remnant from Israel.

The olive tree has some remarkable characteristics that remind us of God’s Covenant family:

• It is not an especially beautiful tree, but has nevertheless received much admiration from artists. Its roots are strong and can survive in a hot, dry climate and in rocky soil.
• Olive trees are well-known for their long life, more so than most fruit trees. Centuries-old olive trees can still bear fruit, and produce tender shoots around their roots.
• The fruit of the olive is either eaten or pressed to make olive oil. It is interesting that the word ‘Gethsemane’, the name of the garden where Jesus went before His betrayal, means ‘olive press’.
• Olive oil has, for thousands of years, been considered a source of wealth. It is useful for cooking, lighting lamps, ceremonial anointing and for medicinal purposes.

We can assume that, in the choice of the olive tree for the metaphor in Romans 11, Paul knew his readers would draw associations between these characteristics. This would help them understand about the root and branches of Israel and the whole Covenant family of God joined together as one body with one heritage, one character and one fruit.

For Study and Prayer: Consider the characteristics of the olive tree and discuss why Paul chose this metaphor to represent the covenant family of all believers.

Next time: Further studies on the olive tree metaphor.

These studies are developed from the course Christianity’s Relationship with Israel and the Jews, first prepared for Tishrei Bible School.

It doesn’t take much serious Bible study to understand that Israel was chosen by Almighty God to be his Covenant Nation. But what should our relationship with Israel be? Clifford Denton opens up a new study series...

The Tanakh (Old Testament) bears witness to Israel's chosen status, and follows its history through all of its phases. When the Nation was divided after the time of King Solomon (2 Chron 10), and following the exile of the Northern Kingdom (2 Kings 17), Judah, just one of the Twelve Tribes, came into prominence.

Yeshua HaMashiach (Jesus the Messiah) came from this Tribe of Judah, and thus from the background of both Israel and Judah. When the Gospel went out across the whole world, Gentiles were called by faith into the Covenant family.

Parting of the Ways

For nearly 2000 years, since the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, the Jews have been dispersed across the world, but have not lost their national identity. Meanwhile, however, various Christian theologies have emerged which have re-positioned the Christian Church as a distinct entity from the Jewish world, severing links between them.

The faith of Jesus and the Apostles was solidly based on the Hebrew Scriptures and Second Temple Judaism. Earliest Christianity was one among the many Judaisms of the first century. Neither Jesus nor the apostles attempted to break away from their heritage and form a new, different, religion. Indeed, the break of the Church from its true roots has had immense consequences, as we shall see in future studies.

"Neither Jesus nor his apostles attempted to break away from their heritage and form a new, different, religion."

The end of the 20th Century and beginning of the 21st have marked a new era of re-discovery. Israel has become a territorial nation again and so Christianity’s roots are being re-assessed. Was the break from the Jewish world unnecessary? If so, in what way is the Church linked to Israel and the Jews?

It is the purpose of this study series to explore this issue, considering some of the reasons for the break and opening up the agenda for re-considering the relationship between Christians and the Jewish world.

Many Topics to Consider

The list of topics to study on this subject is wide-ranging. They include aspects of history, theology, inter-faith dialogue, Hebrew background to Scripture, Judaism through history, the history and consequences of anti-Semitism, the Jewish background to the times of Jesus and the Apostles, and the relevance of Christianity’s Hebraic heritage to family and community life.

God has preserved the Jewish people despite the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, and all the pogroms, anti-Semitism and even the Holocaust of recent history. God has been faithful to his Covenant promises, and biblical prophecies relating to Israel and the Tribe of Judah are being fulfilled before us today.

Now more than ever, we have both the need and the opportunity for Christianity to restore its true roots.

The Church was never intended to divorce itself from its roots, which go down deep into the biblical soil of Israel’s history and formative influences on its culture.

Return to Roots

In our weekly studies, the intention is to open out foundational issues relating to the restoration of the Christian Church to its true roots.

The departure of the Church from these roots has had serious consequences over the years. One is that distance has grown between Christians and Jews, so much so that, whether by default or design, Christians have contributed to the anguish of Jews over the centuries. One consequence of the Christian Church restoring its true roots is that Jewish/Christian relationships will be strengthened again. This is not the only reason for this course of study but it could be a major fruit.

When we study the separation of the Church from the Synagogue and enter into the issue of Jewish/Christian relations, many will find that their old assumptions and pre-conceptions suddenly need to be reconsidered.

For some it is a wake-up call, for others a prompt to repentance, but chiefly it is an opportunity to go forward more securely to the time of the Messiah’s return, conscious of our place in the Olive Tree of Romans 11 and the One New Man of Ephesians 2.

Next week we will look more fully at the metaphor of the Olive Tree.

For study and discussion: read Romans 11 and consider ways in which the Christian Church might be better identified with Israel.

These studies are developed from the course 'Christianity’s Relationship with Israel and the Jews', first prepared for Tishrei Bible School.

We have not learnt the lessons of the Holocaust: the Jewish community in the UK is more vulnerable than at any time since the Second World War.

We are launching Prophecy Today UK online on the first day of Passover, 4 April 2015. This date was chosen because Passover is foundational to biblical faith and prophetic understanding, and is an “appointed time” (in Hebrew, moed) in Scripture when God meets with his people.

Passover in 1945

Having chosen this date, we then realised its significance in European history. Seventy years ago on 4 April 1945, which also fell during ‘the Season of our Freedom’ (another name for Passover), the US Army liberated the Nazi death camp at Ohrdruf, Germany, part of the Buchenwald camp network.

Ohrdruf was the first concentration camp to be liberated by the US Army (Auschwitz in Poland having been liberated by the Russians on 27 January 1945). Among the American soldiers was 20-year-old Charlie Payne from Kansas, who later became the great uncle of President Barack Obama. Obama said that when his uncle returned home, "he just went up into the attic and he didn't leave the house for six months”.¹

Also overwhelmed was General Eisenhower, who wrote:

The things I saw beggar description…The visual evidence and the verbal testimony of starvation, cruelty and bestiality were so overpowering as to leave me a bit sick…I made the visit deliberately, in order to be in a position to give first-hand evidence of these things if ever, in the future, there develops a tendency to charge these allegations merely to 'propaganda.'²

The Allies realised the importance of documenting the German atrocities in film because they thought they would not be believed. As Churchill said, “no words can express the horror…of these frightful crimes”.³ Instead, the images captured by the Allied armies’ film units speak more loudly than words ever could.

In the 1945 film German Concentration Camps Factual Survey, produced by Sidney Bernstein (assisted by Alfred Hitchcock) for the British Ministry for Information, Richard Crossman’s elegiac script commented: “Unless the world learns the lessons these pictures teach, night will fall. But by God’s grace, we who live will learn.”

“Unless the world learns the lessons these pictures teach, night will fall. But by God’s grace, we who live will learn.” - German Concentration Camps Factual Survey, 1945

After the War, many Jews left the graveyard of Europe for the Promised Land. Shamefully, thousands were turned back by the British and were placed in camps in Cyprus and elsewhere. Others were returned to Germany to their horror.

There is speculation that the British government shelved Bernstein’s film so that pity for the Holocaust refugees would not fuel demand for a Jewish homeland in British-controlled territory.⁴ It took until January this year for Bernstein’s film to be shown in its entirety for the first time on British television.⁵ How different would government policy have been, had it been shown to a horrified public in 1945?

Have we learned the lessons of the Holocaust? Or, to echo Crossman’s haunting warning, is night falling? Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme last year, Sir Nicholas Winton, the “British Schindler” who organised the Czech Kinderstransport, said "I don't think we've learned anything...the world today is in a more dangerous situation than it has ever been."⁶

The rise of anti-Semitism in the UK and Europe

Anti-Semitic incidents in the UK reached an all-time high and escalated around Europe during the Gaza conflict in July-August 2014.

In Germany, molotov cocktails were lobbed into the Bergische synagogue in Wuppertal, which was previously destroyed on Kristallnacht. A Berlin imam, Abu Bilal Ismail, called on Allah to "destroy the Zionist Jews…Count them and kill them, to the very last one."⁷ In France, eight synagogues were attacked and one, in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles, was firebombed by a 400-strong mob.⁸

In the UK, the Jewish community’s watchdog for anti-Semitism, the Community Security Trust, recorded 1,168 anti-Semitic incidents in 2014, more than twice as many as 2013.⁹

In London, October 2014, “Five girls from a Jewish secondary school were approached by a man at a London underground station who said: ‘Being Jewish is wrong. You are going to die if you carry on being Jewish’ and ‘I will kill you all after school.’ He grabbed one of the girls by the wrist and said: ‘Come with me and be a Christian’. She kicked him and ran away.”¹⁰

In Norfolk, July 2014, “A leaflet found among Israeli produce in a supermarket featured an image of the Israeli flag with the title ‘The flag of Zionist racist scum’. It read: ‘Deny the Holocaust? Of course there was a holocaust. What a pity Adolf and Co didn’t manage to finish the job properly!’”¹¹

Prejudice in the UK public

We cannot dismiss these incidents as the actions of extremists because prejudice against Jews is alive and well among the general public. The government’s Campaign Against Antisemitism found that nearly half of Britons thought at least one anti‑Semitic view presented to them was ‘definitely or probably true’.¹²

In its Annual Antisemitism Barometer 2015, published a week after the Charlie Hebdo massacre, it concludes:

Britain is at a tipping point: unless antisemitism is met with zero tolerance, it will continue to grow and British Jews may increasingly question their place in their own country.¹³

It also reported that:

Well over half of British Jews (58%) believe Jews may have no long-term future in Europe and "The Mayor of London’s office revealed that in July 2014, when fighting between Israel and Hamas peaked, the Metropolitan Police Service recorded its worst ever month for hate crime in London, 95% of which was antisemitic hate crime directly related to fighting between Israel and Hamas."¹⁴

In the media, Jews in Europe are consistently identified with and blamed for Israel’s actions. Reports describing Palestinians and “Jews” rather than Palestinians and “Israelis” in coverage of events in Israel have reinforced this perception. The Jewish people’s unique dual religious and ethnic identity crosses national boundaries and so anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism are inextricably linked.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper addressing the Knesset (Israel’s Parliament) commented on how anti-Semitism has been dressed in new clothes:

...in much of the western world, the old hatred has been translated into more sophisticated language for use in polite society. People who would never say they hate and blame the Jews for their own failings or the problems of the world instead declare their hatred of Israel and blame the only Jewish state for the problems of the Middle East.

He also said that while criticism of Israeli government policy is not anti-Semitic, criticism that targets only Israel while ignoring violence and oppression in its neighbours is unacceptable.¹⁵

This 'New Anti-semitism', as it is called, based on hatred of Israel’s nationhood (rather than religion or race), has been identified by a number of commentators from the 1960s onwards, including historian Leon Poliakov, who published From Anti-Zionism to Anti-Semitism (1969), and Holocaust survivor Jacques Givet, who used the term 'neo-antisemitism' about the Left’s anti-Zionism. Much has been written since about this phenomenon.^{16, 17}

The Church has fallen broadly into two camps: Christian Zionists (and supporters of Israel of various hues who dislike the term 'Christian Zionist'), and those who question Israel’s right to exist and are sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians.

Paul Charles Merkley in Christian Attitudes towards the State of Israel¹⁸ says that Christian anti Zionism is in part due to the history of missions to the Middle East:

Beginning in the nineteenth century, Christian missionaries from the West – Protestant, Catholic and evangelical – sought the conversion of the Jews of Palestine for about a century, with only the most modest results. On the other hand, missionary efforts among the Arabs did win substantial conversions in the latter half of the nineteenth century and a modest number since. Not unreasonably, Church organizations have been much more open to the political aspirations of their clients than to those of their clients’ adversaries.

He also points out that anti-Zionism “provides respectable camouflage for hostility towards Jews and Judaism that cannot be admitted to oneself or others.” It allows Christians a platform among liberal and fashionable thinkers who condemn Israel as 'apartheid' and 'racist'. It also looks good for the Church to be seen as a champion of 'the oppressed'.¹⁹

Attacks on the increase since Paris and Copenhagen murders

The recent spike in anti-Semitic attacks has continued in the wake of the Paris and Copenhagen attacks, which have spawned a rash of UK incidents.

In Radio 4’s programme Anti-Semitism in the UK: Is it Growing?,²⁰ Assistant Chief Constable Garry Shewan, the national lead on Jewish communities for the Association of Chief Police officers, said that in January 2014 there were 28 anti-Semitic crimes, but this January there were 100. The increase was due to events in Paris inspiring copycat behaviour but also a greater desire to report such incidents.

Also interviewed on the programme was Mehmood Naqshbandi, who visits mosques around the country and advises government and police on Muslim matters. Asked how common Muslim animosity is towards Jewish communities, he said:

It’s a problem which is endemic in the Muslim community. It’s widespread; it covers generations. It is taken for granted when Muslims are talking to other Muslims, people don’t feel any obligation to hold back from expressing the kind of casual racist views about Jews and about the Jewish community that fits the nasty stereotypes of caricatures of Jewish behaviour, expectations of Jewish conduct and so on. It’s a deep-rooted problem, a problem which is not challenged.²¹

Conflicting analysis of Charlie Hebdo attack and other Islamist terror attacks

The Charlie Hebdo massacre in January 2015, including the related attack on a Jewish supermarket, has been blamed on the disaffection of French Muslim youth. If they were more integrated, better off, less marginalised in French society, these things would not happen.

Similarly, after an Islamist terror plot to kill Belgian police was foiled, Professor Peter Neumann of Kings College London (interviewed on Channel 4 news) said the cause was socio-economic. Disenfranchised young men on the margins of society were the problem with Belgium having the highest number of European fighters going to Syria and Iraq. Channel Four News anchor Krishnan Guru-Murthy responded that this was a naive view and that there were also men involved in terror from well-off backgrounds.²²

The debate in the European Parliament on security in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo shooting was no more illuminating. More heat than light was shed, with opinions sharply dividing over Muslim immigration.²³

The roots of anti-Semitism

Pundits and politicians do not know how to tackle Islamist terror because they do not fully understand its roots.

As well as the fierce jealousy for Muhammad which motivated the Charlie Hebdo massacre, anti-Zionism is a key reason for Islamist terror. Beneath that (often ill-concealed) is anti-Semitism. Journalists and politicians insist that you can be anti-Zionist without being anti-Semitic, but the line is frequently crossed. What is certain is that Jews around the world are being identified with Israel and are consequently suffering prejudice and violence, in other words anti-Semitism.

Academics have debated the roots and causes of anti-Semitism to find a unifying factor: is it economic, social, religious, political? Today, Israel’s political actions are blamed. However, that cannot be the cause of anti-Semitism pre-1948 (the year the modern state of Israel was formed).

Anti-Semitism has morphed into different expressions through the ages, but always with one aim: the destruction of the Jewish people. Edward Flannery, in his classic study of anti-Semitism, The Anguish of the Jews,²⁴ concludes that the only unifying aspect of anti-Semitism is its spiritual nature.

Both the religious anti-Judaism of the Christian Church and modern racial anti-Semitism, epitomised by the Nazis, share a spiritual root: an unacknowledged hatred of Christ.

Flannery comments that scholars “have varyingly perceived in the hatred of the Jew an unconscious hatred of Christ, a rebellion against the Christian ‘yoke’ no longer found sweet (Matt 11:30); in a word, a Christophobia.”²⁵ Freud recognised it and said: “In its depths anti-Judaism is anti-Christianity.”²⁶

A number of prominent Nazis were brought up as Catholics: Himmler, Goebbels, Hoess and Hitler. In order to pursue their dream of unfettered German power, they had to throw off moral restraint and embrace a pagan view of man as master of his destiny. Christ and Christianity could serve the Reich but they had to be purged of their Jewish root: the Nazis sought to throw off the shackles of Judeo-Christian morality and return to a mythically powerful Aryan pagan past.

Flannery writes:

His [Hitler’s] genocidal decision against the Jewish people represented, again symbolically, the annihilation of his moral (Jewish-Christian) conscience, which stood in the way of his grandiose dream of a Thousand Year Reich founded on an apotheosis of the German Volk and of himself as its Fuehrer and Saviour.²⁷

In other words, the Nazis did not want simply to destroy the Jews; they wanted to be the Jews. They wanted to be the chosen people, to usurp their place. This usurping spirit is found in scripture. God’s Adversary is described in Isaiah 14:14 as one whose declared aim is, “I will make myself like the Most High.” This is the spirit of Anti-Christ:

He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshipped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God. (2 Thess 2:4)

"The Nazis did not want simply to destroy the Jews; they wanted to be the Jews."

Flannery asserts that “anti-Semitism is at its deepest root a unified phenomenon and from all angles an anti-religious one”²⁸ which resides “in the deepest chambers of the spirit.”²⁹

The rebellion behind anti-Semitism

Nazism was a perfect storm combination of the legacy of Christian anti-Semitism and modern racial anti-Semitism.

It highlighted that not only Christophobia but nomophobia (from nomos, Greek for law), or fear of law (specifically God’s moral law epitomised in the Torah), are hallmarks of anti-Semitism. It was a revolt against the word and the Word made flesh (John 1:14).

In pre-war Germany, Nazi-sympathising theologians were keen to reposition the Bible and theology to accommodate National Socialist ideology, specifically by undermining the place of the Old Testament. In 1939, a group of German theologians established The Institute for the Study and Eradication of Jewish Influence on German Religious Life, aiming to de-Judaize the New Testament and present an Aryan Jesus.³⁰

This ultimate expression of replacement theology was fuelled by anti-Semitism, but rooted in the rebellion of men’s souls against their Creator and his established order. It was satanically inspired: the one who wishes to overthrow and usurp God’s throne is the one who wishes to destroy the Jewish people because by doing so, he will destroy the hope of the world, the Redeemer, who comes from Israel and to Israel.

"When we reject God’s people, we are rejecting God himself."

Rejection of God’s light and truth

A political satire from the 1960s has been revived in the West End. In The Ruling Class³¹ Jack, a fictional earl and paranoid schizophrenic, firstly imagines he is Christ and then Jack the Ripper. As Jesus, his message of peace and love is rejected as insanity. As Jack the Ripper, he takes his seat in the House of Lords with a fiery speech in favour of capital and corporal punishment. His colleagues applaud wildly (completely unaware the speech is the ranting of a lunatic), in contrast to society's reaction when he believed he was Christ.

The play was intended as an indictment of the establishment, but it also testifies that people are more comfortable with the darkness of sin, condemnation and punishment than with the light of Christ’s love, peace and grace. Man’s rebellious nature is so corrupt that it sees evil in good and good in evil.

The temptation for Adam and Eve was to become the arbiters of good and evil, to dethrone God’s judgement and become their own judges. The Torah, as God’s wisdom, is a “tree of life” to man (Prov 3:18), but it also is the means of our judgement and the harbinger of death to those who reject it (Rom 3:20 and 7:7-9).

We seek to destroy that which exposes and accuses us; Israel as the bearer and enacter of God's Law has paid the price for exposing it to the world and, by its light, exposing the world’s darkness.

The Torah was also the means of keeping Israel separate from other nations: a holy people (Ex 19:6). It prevented them from being assimilated. They had to remain separate in order to be worshippers of God, not idol-worshippers like every other nation, so they could be prepared to receive God himself.

This is why in Israel’s history the Adversary (in Hebrew, Satan) sought alternately either to undermine the Torah by enticing Israel away from God and his Word to make them like all the other nations, or to destroy Israel in order to prevent the coming of the Messiah. If your enemies cannot be assimilated, they must be annihilated and from the Amalekites to Haman, from Herod to Hitler, this murderous desire persists.

The Adversary did not succeed in destroying the Jewish people before the first advent of the Messiah – but he persists because that is only part one of the salvation story.
We await the second coming: Jesus’ promised return in power and glory to reign from Jerusalem over all the earth: “This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11).

Jerusalem is fought over because it is the City to which Messiah will return. He will not find it empty or still being “trampled down by the Gentiles” (Luke 21:24). Instead, he will return to re-gathered Israel:

In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious. In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to reclaim the surviving remnant of his people. (Isa 11:10-11a)

He will redeem Israel and all who have joined with them by faith from among the Gentiles (Eph 2:11-22).

Anti-Semitism and the anti-Christ spirit

The world continually rejects Israel and the Jewish people because they reject God’s call to be joined with them through the Messiah. Through Israel’s particularity, the ‘narrow way’ of the kingdom (Matt 7:14), we are called to become “one new humanity” (Eph 2:15) in spiritual unity (not uniformity) which is the only true peace available to mankind.

However, by placing the Church centre stage in salvation history and declaring that she has superseded Israel in God’s plans and purposes, the majority of believers have failed to understand that the Church is not the main player on the stage of history.

Israel, both people and land, is still the subject of the salvation story because all God’s salvation promises were made to Israel and to those Gentiles who join with her, through her Messiah by faith.

Sadly, before Christian theology was re-assessed in the light of the Holocaust, the Church was the main instrument of Jewish persecution. However, Christians still remain largely unaware of the bleak history of Christian anti-Semitism and how the teaching that the Church has replaced Israel has contributed to it.

Inspiring 'Replacement theology' or supersessionism, the teaching that the Church has replaced Israel in God’s plans and purposes, is the same jealous, usurping spirit, the spirit of Anti-Christ, which aims to overthrow God's end-time plans (for a more in-depth analysis of Replacement theology, click here).

The same spirit is at work in Islamic teaching, which claims that Mohammed’s teachings supersede Judaism and Christianity. Rejected Ishmael jealously insists he was chosen, not his half-brother Isaac: my promises, my land!³² It is a triumphalist theology, unwilling to tolerate difference unless in submission to its rule.

Wherever the Holy Spirit is at work, the anti-Christ spirit, hallmarked by jealousy in man, is also at work. People of all faiths and all religious backgrounds have expressed it. Peace and harmony for mankind, but intolerance and jealousy of the Jewish people are hallmarks of religion of all kinds, including New Age spirituality (one of the main protagonists of the New Age movement, Alice Bailey (a former evangelical Christian³³), equated Judaism with “an evil cosmic energy called ‘The Jewish Force’, which must be eliminated in order for the Age of Aquarius to arrive fully”³⁴).

"Wherever the Holy Spirit is at work, the anti-Christ spirit, hallmarked by jealousy in man, is also at work."

The Jewish leaders who opposed Jesus were said to be jealous of him and that is why they handed him over to Pilate (Mark 15:10). This jealousy continued to be vented against his Jewish followers. In Acts 5:17-18:

Then the high priest and all his associates, who were members of the party of the Sadducees, were filled with jealousy. They arrested the apostles and put them in the public jail.

In militant Islam, this jealous, usurping spirit finds violent, implacable expression. It is fuelled by an irrational spiritual jealousy that cannot be appeased (Prov 27:4). Only the Holy Spirit can withstand and conquer the spirit of anti-Christ and in turn counter it with a godly jealousy that cannot be withstood: “I am very jealous for Jerusalem and Zion” (Zech 1:14).

It is the God of Israel’s land, his city, the place where he has set his name:

In this temple and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put my Name forever. (2 Chron 33:7)

I will put them on trial for what they did to my inheritance, my people Israel, because they scattered my people among the nations and divided up my land. (Joel 3:2)

The Church’s response

After 9/11, there was much talk of the ‘clash of civilizations’ between Islam and western secularism. This is not a battle of civilizations; it is a spiritual war. It must be fought with spiritual weapons.³⁵

Ordinary Muslims are shocked and outraged by extremists and many will be seeking answers; the Church must be prepared to explain, challenge and comfort. We must demonstrate that Christianity is an Eastern religion, which speaks to all peoples, and forms the lost and dwindling heritage of the peoples of the Middle East. We also need to show that Christianity is not a religion for the individual but for the community. Western enlightenment thinking is unappealing to Muslims with its focus on individual rights, because Middle Eastern cultures focus on community cohesion.

However, the Church has its own challenge: anti-Semitism is infecting the Church in the form of Christian anti-Zionism and it must also be addressed. In pre-war Germany, theologians were ready to distance themselves from the Old Testament and from a Jewish Jesus so that they could comfortably reject and persecute the Jewish people.

"Today's Church has appropriated God's promises to Israel and denied its role and place in God's end-time plan."

Today’s Church is dangerously misaligned too. We have appropriated God’s promises to Israel and denied the people and land of Israel their role and place in God’s end-time plan. This means we can comfortably distance ourselves from anti-Semitism because we can claim it is bound up with anti-Zionism. Jews have always been blamed for their own misfortunes and the fight for survival in their own nation is cited as the legitimate cause for Islamic violence.

However, land and people are inextricably linked in God’s schema: “I who set the heavens in place, who laid the foundations of the earth…say to Zion, 'You are my people.'" (Isa 51:16). Zion- land and people -are conflated in this verse illustrating that their destinies are linked: salvation for the Jewish people is connected to the land of promise. It is this very link between land and people that is expressed in the final form of anti-Semitism that is increasing and intensifying today: anti-Zionism.

If we say that Israel has no right to the land God promised them, that those rights were superseded, we are setting ourselves against God’s end time plans. It is his land and by his sovereign choice he has restored his people to it.

We are also denying God’s covenant faithfulness if we say that he has finished with Israel as a nation:

'Only if these decrees vanish from my sight,’ declares the Lord, ‘will Israel ever cease being a nation before me. Only if the heavens above can be measured and the foundations of the earth below be searched out will I reject all the descendants of Israel’ declares the LORD. (Jer 31:36-37)

In that same chapter, Jeremiah 31, God promises the New Covenant to Israel, including a Jerusalem that will never be uprooted or demolished (Jer 31:40). This is not a promise to the Church but to Israel. We are the adopted children, the invited guests, but we have arrogantly overrun the party.

Many are sleep-walking in the end times, accepting unquestioningly the world's political narrative that the conflict between Israel and Palestinians concerns a land which is no longer spiritually significant. This is not to say that Christians should uncritically support the Israeli state’s government and policies, but we must view them through the lens of Scripture, not the other way around. We must also still unstintingly love those who persecute us and God’s people Israel: “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matt 5:44).

"We must also still unstintingly love those who persecute us and God’s people Israel: “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matt 5:44)."

We must, though, reject the subtle Christian anti-Semitism which seeks to sever the link between the biblical land of Israel and its current prophetic significance.
Giulio Meotti writes:

The Presbyterian Church USA is considering banning the word “Israel” from its prayers. That anti-Semitic resolution was meant to ‘distinguish between the biblical terms that refer to the ancient land of Israel and the modern political State of Israel’.³⁶

It is imperative that Bible-believing Christians reject this replacement narrative and align with Israel and the Jewish community because the spiritual battle lines are already drawn.

The need for solidarity

A friend doing door-to-door outreach met a Jewish lady who thanked her for calling and commented that the time is coming when Jews and Christians will need to stand together.

That time is now.

The Jewish Chronicle launched a campaign for the government to pay for synagogue security.³⁷ Why should Christian volunteers not show their solidarity with the Jewish community by volunteering to guard synagogues during Saturday services?

After the shooting of a synagogue guard in Denmark, around 1,000 Muslims (5% of the Muslim population) in Norway formed a 'ring of peace' around a synagogue in Oslo.³⁸

Where are the Christian demonstrations of solidarity? We cannot retreat into our safe churches and relax because it is not us at risk. Pastor Martin Niemöller’s famous words, written after being imprisoned by the Nazis, still resonate:

When the Nazis came for the communists, I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats, I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists, I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for the Jews, I remained silent;
I wasn't a Jew. When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out.

Dan Hodges in The Telegraph: “…as the Paris attacks proved, they are still coming for the Jews. In reality, they have never stopped coming for the Jews.”³⁹

The lesson from the Middle Eastern nations under Islamic State control is that since the Jews had already left, the Christians are next in their sights. If we withdraw from the Jewish community when they need our support, how can we dare pray for our own protection?

After the Paris terror attacks, some London schools cancelled Holocaust education trips to synagogues. Two rabbis from a Kingston synagogue commented that although the schools felt they were acting in the children’s interests:

...it marginalises the Jewish community to be the pariah within our society, not through active discrimination but through neglect…For us this marks a tipping point, not when Jews are concerned for their own safety but when others are scared of mere connection to our community.⁴⁰

It is time for the Church to stand unequivocally with the Jewish people in the name of their Messiah. The battle surrounding Israel is going to intensify and we cannot again stand by watching from a distance while the Jewish people are persecuted.

We cannot be people who, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, withdraw to a "the sanctuary of private virtuousness. Such people neither steal, nor murder, nor commit adultery, but do good according to their abilities. But in voluntarily renouncing public life, these people know exactly how to observe the permitted boundaries that shield them from conflict. They must close their eyes and ears to the injustice around them.”⁴¹

The rise of anti-Semitism in Europe indicates that we have not learned from history and the rise of Islamist terror as the frontline jihad of raging anti-Semitism masked as anti-Zionism suggests that night is falling.

As the day darkens, as night falls, we must shine ever more brightly with the light of Christ until the daystar dawns (2 Pet 1:19).

References

1 Medoff, R. Death camp liberated Pesach 1945, Israel National News, 31 March 2010

2 Ohrdruf Concentration Camp, Wikipedia.

3 Speech in the House of Commons, 17 April 1945. Churchill, W (grandson), 2003. Never Give In!: Winston Churchill’s Speeches, London: Bloomsbury.

4 Lynette Singer (writer) on ‘Holocaust: Night Will Fall’, documentary broadcast on Channel 4, 29 January 2015.

5 Ibid.

6 Sir Nicholas Winton: I've made a difference. BBC Radio 4, broadcast 28 October 2014.

7 Henley, J. Antisemitism on rise across Europe 'in worst times since the Nazis’, The Guardian, 7 August 2014.

8 Ibid.

9 Booth, R. Antisemitic attacks in UK at highest level ever recorded, The Guardian, 15 February 2015.

10 Ibid.

11 Ibid.

12 Annual Antisemitism Barometer 2015

13 Ibid, p2.

14 Ibid, p5.

15 Goodman, L, PM Harper warns of new age of anti-Semitism in speech to Knesset, The Record, 20 January 2014.

16 Eg Wistrich, R, 2010. A Lethal Obsession: Anti-Semitism from Antiquity to the Global Jihad, Random House, New York.

17 Kahn-Harris, K, Gidley, B, 2010. Turbulent Times: The British Jewish Community Today, Bloomsbury Publishing, p139.

18 Merkley, P C, 2001. Christian Attitudes towards the State of Israel, McGill-Queen’s University Press, Montreal & Kinston, p215-216.

19 Ibid.

20 Anti-Semitism in the UK: is it growing?, broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on 5 March 2015.

21 Ibid.

22 Channel 4 News, 16 January 2015.

23 European Parliament debate, 11 February 2015.

24 Flannery, EH, 1985. The Anguish of the Jews: Twenty-Three Centuries of Antisemitism, New Jersey: Paulist Press, revised 2004.

25 Ibid, p292.

26 Ibid, p292, quoting S. Freud, Moses and Monotheism, New York: Vantage Books, 1955, pp116-117.

27 Ibid, p292.

28 Ibid, p293-4.

29 Ibid, p295.

30 Heschel, S, 2010. The Aryan Jesus: Christian Theologians and the Bible in Nazi Germany, Princeton University Press.

31 By Peter Barnes.

32 See Genesis 16-18, 21.

33  Joseph E, 2004. Krotona of Old Hollywood, Vol. II, El Montecito Oaks Press, p. 340. See also Wikipedia on Alice Bailey-Ross.

34 Harradine, K. New Agers fall for Anti-Semitism, The Jewish Chronicle, 17 September 2013. Also Newman, H, 2005. 'Aquarius, Age of', entry in Levy et al (eds) Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, Vol 1, p30.

35 Ephesians 6:10-18

36 Meotti, G. To Anti-Semitic Christians, Israel is an Usurper, 5 January 2015.

37 Jewish Chronicle Online, Secure our shuls, 19 February 2015.

38 Stone, J. Hundreds of Norwegian Muslims form human shield to protect Jewish synagogue in Oslo, The Independent, 22 February 2015.

39 Hodges, D. They are still coming for the Jews. So why is nobody speaking out?, The Telegraph, 19 January 2015

40 Bingham, J. London schools cancel synagogue trips citing security fears after Paris terror attacks, The Telegraph, 6 February 2015.

41 Bonhoeffer, D. Ethics, DBWE 6, 80. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Research Center, University of Bamberg.

Replacement Theology is a denial of the promises of God made to Jacob and his descendants. It is a false doctrine which has long been endemic in the Gentile Church, teaching that the promises made by God to his chosen nation Israel have been rendered null and void by the death of Jesus at Calvary, and are now applicable only to the Church.

Behind this erroneous interpretation lies a darker force: the demonic spirit of anti-Semitism.

God’s Covenant with Israel

The first 11 chapters of the Bible document the increasing corruption of mankind which followed the Fall, the resulting grief and anger of God which brought the Noahic flood, and the subsequent continuing rebellion culminating in the building of the Tower of Babel and God’s judgement in the form of confusion of language and scattering of the rebellious people.

In chapter 12, however, we read of a new initiative on God’s part; his calling of Abram to be the progenitor of a new nation through which the entire world would receive the blessing of salvation.

In Genesis 15 comes God’s further confirmation of that decision, in the form of a solemn covenant with Abram and his heirs which He makes unilaterally and unconditionally. This covenant is reaffirmed to Isaac in Genesis 26, and to Jacob in Genesis 35; and is expressed in Psalm 105:8-10 to be everlasting.

"Jacob’s descendants are irrevocably destined to be God’s chosen earthly nation through whom Messiah would come, and are granted an inalienable right to ownership of the land of Canaan."

Jacob’s descendants are irrevocably destined to be God’s chosen earthly nation through whom Messiah, the woman’s offspring (Gen 3:15), would come, and are granted an inalienable right to ownership of the land of Canaan (Gen 17:8).

What is Replacement Theology?

Replacement Theology is a denial of the validity of these promises of God to Jacob’s descendants. It is a false doctrine which has been endemic in the Gentile Church during most of her history, teaching that the promises made by God to his chosen representative nation Israel have been rendered null and void by the death of Jesus at Calvary, and that in consequence the Hebrew nation is no longer to be regarded as God’s chosen people.

The doctrine effectively declares that much of God’s Word is now obsolete, teaching that Israel has been disinherited and that both the calling and the promises of God are now applicable only to the Church, which is seen to have superseded the Hebrew nation in God’s purposes and to have become the “new Israel”.

However, to quote Malcolm Hedding, former Executive Director of the International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem:

Replacement Theology is nowhere to be found in the Bible…From a theological perspective, the Replacement doctrine can only exist if one can prove that the Abrahamic covenant has been abolished.¹

"Replacement Theology is nowhere to be found in the Bible…From a theological perspective, the Replacement doctrine can only exist if one can prove that the Abrahamic covenant has been abolished.” - Malcom Hedding

Such a teaching is driven by the spirit of anti-Semitism and the failure to understand that unless allegory is being used, Scripture is to be interpreted according to its plain literal meaning. When God says, concerning the descendants of Jacob, that “the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable” (Rom 11:29), He means exactly what He says. He will not reject his chosen earthly representative nation, nor will He revoke his stated purposes and promises concerning them.

To teach that God has cast aside the nation of Israel and broken the covenant which he made unconditionally and unilaterally with Abraham in Genesis 15 is to make God out to be a liar, and to reject the plain teaching of Paul in Romans 11: “…has God cast away His people? By no means!”²

Paul explains the truth of what has taken place in the relationship between God and Israel, and warns the Gentile believers against the arrogance of thinking that they now have preference over the Jews and have replaced them in God’s purposes. In verses 28-29, Paul explains clearly that they remain God’s elect people and that He will never cease to love the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, nor withdraw His stated purposes for them.

The Origins of Replacement Teaching

In the light of the plain teaching of the Word of God, what accounts for the error which gives rise to the belief that the Church, which has been almost entirely Gentile since the end of the Second Century, has replaced Israel in God’s affection and purpose; and that Israel has therefore also forfeited the right to the land covenanted to the patriarchs? Why did the early Church Fathers introduce teaching which so twisted and perverted the plain statements of Scripture, robbing them of their clear and unambiguous meaning?

By the end of the second century, the Church had become largely Gentile, influenced by the Greek philosophy of the Roman Empire and becoming separated from her Jewish roots.

As early as 160 A.D. Justin Martyr was viewing the Church as the new Israel. In his ‘Dialogue with Trypho, a Jew’, Justin he declares to Trypho that the Hebrew Scriptures are “not yours, but ours” (chapter 29:2), while in chapter 82 he says, concerning the writings of the Hebrew prophets: “For the prophetical gifts remain with us [ie the Church], even to the present time. And hence you ought to understand that [the gifts] formerly among your nation have been transferred to us.”³

By the third century, early Church theologian Origen of Alexandria was teaching that the correct way to understand the Scriptures was by spiritualising the text and treating it as allegory.⁴

There is a profound difference between the Hebraic method of literal interpretation of Scripture at its face value and the Greek method, which tends to the error of taking the literal words and treating them as if they were simply allegorical. Consequently, where for the Hebrew mind the Word of God determines the doctrine, the Greek mind tends first to form the doctrine and then where necessary, to distort (or totally ignore) the word so as to make it fit.

The Spirit of Anti-Semitism

However, behind this erroneous way of interpretation and consequent false teaching lies a darker force. It is the demonic spirit of anti-Semitism, which is rearing its ugly head yet again in great strength and virulence in our own days. The Gentile Church Fathers were influenced not only by Greek thinking and philosophy, but also by increasing prejudice against the Jews as being a race of unbelievers who were responsible for deicide and had become rejected and cursed by God, the satanic lie which would lead to centuries of persecution and ultimately to the Holocaust.

"Behind this erroneous way of interpretation and consequent false teaching lies a darker force: the demonic spirit of anti-Semitism."

What accounts for the phenomenon of anti-Semitism, which has pursued and persecuted the Hebrew nation throughout their long history? What strange hatred led, for example, to the mass slaughter of all male Hebrew infants in Egypt (Ex 1:15-22); or to the thwarted desire of Haman (Est 3:8-15) to perpetrate the genocide of all the Jews in the province of Persia; of to the massacre at Herod’s command of male infants in Bethlehem (Matt 2:16-18)?

The root cause of the mysterious undying purpose of anti-Semitism to exterminate the Jewish people is to be found first in Genesis 3:15, where God declares that the seed of the woman will crush Satan’s head. Secondly, in Genesis 12:3 and 22:18, His promise to Abram is that “all the nations of the earth will be blessed through you”.

The recognition that this meant that Messiah, the promised seed of the woman, would arise from the offspring of Abraham brought the inevitable consequence of continued satanic attempts to prevent the fulfilment of the Word of God, first by destroying the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob so as to make impossible the first coming of the promised Messiah; and when that had failed, to destroy Jesus during His earthly life and ministry.

Following that failure, the object became to prevent His promised return by continuing attempts to destroy all Jacob’s descendants, so as to make impossible their prophesied return from exile among the nations to the land given by God’s covenant promise (eg Gen 15:18) to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their descendants, summarised in the words of Psalm 105: 8-11:

He remembers his covenant forever...the covenant he made with Abraham…He confirmed it to Jacob as a decree, to Israel as an everlasting covenant: ‘To you I will give the land of Canaan as the portion you will inherit.’

The 20th Century and Today

This satanic determination to prevent the word of God from coming to pass has had tragic but inevitable consequences for the Hebrew nation through many centuries. It reached a climax after the Balfour Declaration in 1917 (affirmed at the San Remo Conference of 1920) was enshrined into International Law in 1922, by the League of Nations’ Mandate to Great Britain to oversee the re-establishment of the Jewish homeland in the land called Palestine by the Romans, but now the sovereign state of Israel.

That series of events aroused the spirit of anti-Semitism to a new level of activity, resulting in Hitler’s attempted 'Final Solution', the Holocaust; and since 1948, in continual attempts to separate the restored Hebrew nation from the land of Israel by any and every possible means.

The prophecy of Daniel (9:26) concerning Jerusalem is that “war will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed”. The spirit of anti-Semitism will continue to stir up strife and destruction against Israel, and against all Jewish people throughout the nations, until Scripture is fulfilled in the return of Jesus the Messiah to save His people and to establish His rule on the earth.

"Unless we believe and teach that the Word of God means what it says, none of us is exempt from falling into error."

The anti-Semitism which continues the hatred and persecution of Jewish people wherever they may be, and the anti-Zionism which rages against the very existence of the State of Israel, are of one and the same antichrist origin and purpose. The unbelieving world cannot understand this, but the professing Church believes and teaches the anti-Semitic doctrine of Replacement Theology at its peril, for by so doing it is denying the Word of God and encouraging hostility against His people and His stated purposes. If we do, we fall into the trap of cursing the descendants of Abraham and consequently bringing God’s curse upon ourselves (Gen 12:3).

Unless we believe and teach that the Word of God means what it says, none of us is exempt from falling into error. The warning contained in Romans 11:17-21 is as valid today for us, as Gentile believers, as it was for the first hearers to whom Paul was writing: “Do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches…Do not be arrogant, but tremble.” The covenant which God made with Abraham remains guaranteed by the unchanging character of God, and He will remain faithful to fulfil all that He has promised concerning the descendants of Jacob.

References

1 Hedding, M, 2006. Standing with Israel Today, ICEJ Word from Jerusalem, May/June edition (first published in The Jerusalem Post Christian Edition, March 2006).

2 Rom 11:1, New King James Version.

3 Dialogue with Trypho the Jew. 2nd Century AD, transl. George Reith.

4 Eg On First Principles, Book IV.

Christians are again in danger of being silenced over Israel: Charles Gardner asks if we have truly learnt the lessons of the Holocaust.

Anti-Semitism alive and well in Europe

A controversial church leader has been severely reprimanded for posting a link on Facebook blaming Israel for the 9/11 attacks on the United States. Rev. Stephen Sizer, Vicar of Christ Church in Virginia Water, Surrey, has since apologized for his “ill-considered and misguided” action¹ and removed the link. However, he has been banned from using social media for six months.

A Church of England spokesman said it was a matter of “deep sorrow and shame”² that the posts appeared in the same week as the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, when the full horror of Nazi crimes against the Jews was revealed to the world. The Bishop of Guildford, Rt Rev. Andrew Watson, said Rev. Sizer’s actions were “indefensible” and has set a series of conditions on him keeping his job.³

This small incident forms part of a much more widespread increase of anti-Semitism in recent months. The jihadist attacks in Paris and Copenhagen, where Jewish communities are now living in extreme fear, indicate another source of vehement hatred of Jews: fundamentalist Islam. These examples from within Europe do not touch on the world-wide increase of anti-Semitic action and feeling, most of which is not reported by mainstream media.

Remembering the Holocaust

2015 marks the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, when the full horror of Nazi crimes against the Jews was revealed to the world. Recently Sister Thekla, a German nun, has spoken of her shame at the suffering caused by her nation through the Holocaust: “It grieves me what my nation has done, especially to the Jewish people,” she told a conference in York on Israel and the Church.⁴

“We had touched the apple of God’s eye and saw God’s judgment poured out on our nation as a result,” she said, in reference to the repeated bombing of Darmstadt. One 1944 attack on Darmstadt killed 10 percent of its inhabitants and made 60 percent of its population homeless.

“We had touched the apple of God’s eye and saw God’s judgment poured out on our nation as a result” - Sister Thekla, German nun, regarding the Holocaust

The Darmstadt bombings prompted local resident Basilea Schlink to found the Evangelical Sisterhood of Mary, dedicated to reconciliation with the Jewish people. Mother Basilea and a group of fellow Christians wept under deep conviction of the terrible sins committed by Germany against the Jews, dating back to the time of the Crusades. Subsequently they went to Israel to volunteer their services as nurses, and to seek forgiveness from the Jewish people. She said:

We can never heal the wounds. Only Christ can do that. It is a painful memory, but I confess these crimes...If the German community had stood up as one man, the Nazis would not have been at such liberty to pursue their schemes. Where was the Christian church?⁵

She warned that today’s church was in danger of repeating history.

Will history repeat itself?

The tragedy of anti-Semitism is not just something in the past. It is flaring up again. And in the not-too-distant future we Christians will all be challenged about our relationship with Israel. Will Christians once more stay silent?

"In the not-too-distant future, Christians will all be challenged again about our relationship with Israel. Will we stay silent?"

Also addressing the York conference, organised by the Emmaus Group, was Sister Glory, a British member of the order with a Methodist background:

Israel is once again hated by the nations, which is a picture of our Lord Jesus, who was despised and rejected of men. We are called to pray for Israel. They need love, born out of repentance, the only kind that will open their hearts. We have often not presented the true image of Jesus to them.

Britain is complicit

Sister Glory also emphasised that the British have blood on their hands concerning Israel. She referred to 1190 when the entire Jewish community of York were herded into Clifford’s Tower, just across the river from the conference venue, and massacred. A hundred years later Jews were expelled from Britain altogether, before being welcomed back at the time of Cromwell through the influence of the Pilgrim Fathers (a radical Christian group who were themselves hounded out of the country before emerging as the founding fathers of the United States).

More recently, following Britain’s Balfour Declaration of 1917 promising support for a Jewish national homeland, the Government reneged on its pledge by dividing the allocated land, and acting treacherously to appease the Arabs while forcing the Jews to disarm. Many Jews trying to escape the Holocaust to Israel were turned back and some died when their boat sank.

“We betrayed the greatest trust ever given to a nation”, Sister Glory added. And now Britain is in danger of repeating history, with the strong message of support Parliament has sent to the Palestinian Authority over its quest for state recognition.

Those who bless Israel will be blessed

In experiencing the fulfillment of Genesis 12:3 (that those who bless Israel will themselves be blessed, while those who curse her will come under judgment), Britain has suffered the loss of her Empire along with increasing brokenness within the nation itself.

Sister Glory ended by quoting former British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli: “The Lord deals with the nations as the nations deal with the Jews.”

What will our response be? For if you really love Jesus, you will love His people, the Jews.

References

1 Sizer, S, Statement of Apology, released 30 January 2015.

2 Church of England, Statement on Rev Stephen Sizer, released 29 January 2015.

3 Bishop of Guildford, Right Rev Andrew Watson, Statement on Stephen Sizer, released 9 February 2015.

4 'The Messiah, the Church and Israel' conference, 22 November 2014, Park Inn York, Emmaus Group.

5 Ibid, quote by Sister Thekla.

Charles Gardner is a journalist originally from South Africa, now living in Yorkshire. He is part Jewish and writes for The Times of Israel.

Jews threatened with another Holocaust

...but does anyone care?

Charles Gardner considers the hatred mounting against Israel on every side.

Seventy years after six million Jews were slaughtered in the ovens of Nazi Germany, a new generation are in grave danger of another attempt at genocide. But just as Churchill’s warnings fell on deaf ears in the 1930s, so today the rest of the world is looking the other way, pretending such a threat does not exist.

This is a constant frustration for those who support Israel, because ignorance leaves people vulnerable to the lies, propaganda and deception spreading like cancer through the corridors of power.

Israel under attack

Israel has been surrounded by implacable enemies wishing to drive it into the sea ever since its re-birth in 1948. Now it is faced with an additional black cloud in the form of Islamic State terrorists who, when they are done with butchering Christians, Yazidis and their own people, plan to turn their full attention on the Jewish state standing in the way of their dream for absolute control of the region.

"Israel has been surrounded by implacable enemies wishing to drive it into the sea ever since its re-birth in 1948."

Israelis have been living under the constant threat of rocket attacks from Gaza and elsewhere for years, along with oft-repeated warnings of destruction from an Iranian government fast developing nuclear weapons. And even as they were diving for cover from Hamas missiles during the recent conflict, they were witnessing the nearby emergence of ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Syria), whose declared ambition is the creation of an Islamic Caliphate in the region, to which the Jewish state acts as possibly the only real barrier.

ISIS fellow-travellers Al Qaeda, Boko Haram and Al Shabaab are currently concentrating their efforts on Christians and others in their way as, for the moment, access to the Jewish state is largely blocked by strong defensive tactics. Long may that continue, but when they manage to break through these barriers, as they did in Paris, we see what carnage results.

Western blindness

Through all this, Western leaders continue to deny Israel the right to defend herself. Following the massacre in France of twelve journalists at a satirical magazine known for ridiculing religion, terrorists thought to be linked with Al Qaeda turned on perfectly innocent Jews shopping in a kosher supermarket. Millions turned out in a subsequent rally in revulsion against such an attack on press freedom, but how many among them – including journalists – understood why Jews were a target?

Anti-Semitism did not die with the defeat of Germany in World War II. The baton of this demonic relay has been passed back to Islamic fundamentalists, who have previous form in this department and who relish the prospect of wiping out God’s Chosen People.

      "Through all this, Western leaders continue to deny Israel the right to defend herself."

Western civilisation, including its backbone of democracy and freedom, owes huge cultural debts to the Jews, who gave us the Bible, and who gave us Jesus. But Islamists think they are doing God a service by crushing every notion of freedom under the jackboot of 'Sharia Law', a particularly harsh code of ethics that includes the cutting off of limbs as moral punishment.

In the numerous strict Muslim countries across the Middle East, the populace is enslaved by Islam, prevented on pain of death from converting to Christianity or any other religion. The tragedy is that the Western media has largely fallen for a gigantic lie – that Arabs are the victims of bullying tactics from the likes of Israel, the only democracy in the region. Truth is thus turned on its head.

Duplicity at the top

Among the ‘world’ leaders taking part in the Paris march, in itself a tremendous display of support for freedom, was Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, a sponsor of terror. What was he doing there – the man who refuses to recognise Israel’s sovereignty, who sanctions laws which condemn to death any Arab caught selling land to a Jew,¹ and who has also stated that not a single Jew will be allowed to live in his proposed Palestinian state?²

The sometimes duplicitous nature of Arab politics has been explained by former PLO terrorist Tass Saada, who says that lying, for example, is considered to be acceptable if it advances their cause³. As for Iran’s reportedly moderate new president, Hassan Rouhani, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told the United Nations General Assembly that “Rouhani is a wolf in sheep’s clothing...who thinks he can pull the wool over the eyes of the international community.”⁴ 

He also reminded them that from 1989 to 2003 the new president headed up Iran’s Supreme National Security Council during which time opposition leaders were gunned down in a Berlin restaurant, 85 people were murdered at the Jewish Community Centre in Buenos Aires and 19 American soldiers were killed when the Khobar Towers were blown up in Saudi Arabia. Currently they are providing direct support for the murderous Assad regime in Syria.

Yet the West is quick to believe the duplicitous diatribe that speaks of a peaceful purpose for their nuclear programme. As journalist Melanie Phillips has put it, Iran has been protected ever since their 1979 revolution "by a mysterious cloak of denial and paralysis...with the West tragically still in appeasement mode"⁵. 

Meanwhile, the Israeli leader assures the world that he desires peace, but for this to be achieved Palestinians must finally recognise the Jewish state (which they constantly refuse to do) and Israel’s security needs must be met.

"There is no 'occupation' – that is a myth absorbed by a gullible media quick to dance to the anti-Semitic tune of left-wing propaganda."

Protestors campaigning on behalf of Palestinians show their ignorance by talking of 'stolen Palestinian land'. Actually, the coveted West Bank (Judea and Samaria) was originally re-captured from Jordan, not the Palestinians, in a war of self-defence in 1967 – Jordan having annexed the territory from Israel’s allotted land in the 1948 war of independence.

There is no 'occupation' – that is a myth absorbed by a gullible media quick to dance to the anti-Semitic tones of left-wing propaganda. The truth is that Israel is being crammed into a tiny state far smaller than the international community originally agreed upon, and now even long-term allies like Britain and the United States are trying to carve it up further. Shame on them!

However, with Islamic jihadists rapidly changing the game, who knows what future alliances may emerge? It is now not inconceivable that the United States could line up with Iran in a bid to stop the relentless onward threat to the entire region posed by ISIS, not to mention Russia. None of these possible scenarios will allay the fears of Israel.

Silence is not an option

In the face of all this, we dare not remain silent. The annual Jewish feast of Purim (March 4-5 2015) marks their rescue from an extermination plot nearly five centuries before Christ. Only the intervention of Queen Esther, the beautiful Jewish wife of the Persian King Xerxes, prevented the catastrophe. She had been warned by her uncle and guardian, Mordecai, that keeping quiet would be no guarantee she would escape the genocide herself and he suggested that her royal position may well have been “for such a time as this” (Est 4:14).

Behind the plot was Haman, the king’s chief minister (perhaps coincidentally, there is a group with a very similar name today – Hamas – still threatening to destroy the Jewish people). Haman had said to King Xerxes:

There is a certain people dispersed and scattered among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom whose customs are different…it is not in the king’s best interest to tolerate them. (Est 3:8)

Likewise today, Hamas and many others within the Arab/Muslim world simply will not tolerate the existence of a Jewish nation, not least because they stand in the way of complete Islamic rule of the most strategic part of the world.

This is what the battle is all about: it has little to do with injustice suffered by the Palestinian people, and everything to do with Islamic rule. Hamas opposes all ‘peace talks’ and ultimately wants to establish an Islamic state of Palestine in the entire territory originally set aside for the Jews by international agreement.

"This is what the battle is all about: it has little to do with injustice suffered by the Palestinian people, and everything to do with Islamic rule."

We can choose to remain silent and complacent or, like Esther, we can decide to act and advocate for the rights and protection of both Christians and Jews.

For more on this subject read my book, Israel the Chosen, available from Amazon at £6.99.

Footnote: The Romans re-named Israel 'Palestine' (a corruption of Israel’s old enemies the Philistines) to add insult to injury after destroying their nation in AD 135. Jews themselves were known as Palestinians before Yasser Arafat, in an extraordinary act of identity theft, adopted it for his own fraudulent campaign designed to drive God’s chosen people out of the region.

References

1 PA court: Sale of Palestian land to Israelis is punishable by death, Ha'aretz, 20 September 2010.

2 Abbas: 'not a single Israeli' in future Palestinian state, Jerusalemn Post/Reuters, 30 July 2013.

3 Saada, T & Merrill, D, 2008. Once an Arafat Man. Tyndale House Publishing, IL.

4 Transcript of Netanyahu's UN General Assembly Speech, Ha'aretz, 1 October 2013.

5 Phillips, M, 2013. It's 1938 all over again, 22 November.

Charles Gardner is a journalist originally from South Africa, now living in Yorkshire. He is part Jewish and writes for The Times of Israel.