Out of Zion

Announcer: Welcome to the Israel Answers series, connecting Israel, the Bible, and you. Join Susan Michael as she explores timely issues and current events from a scriptural perspective to equip the Christian world with a balanced and biblical response. Be sure to subscribe for future episodes, which will ignite your faith and bring the Bible to life in your everyday world. Now, let's join Susan with your Israel Answers.

Dr. Susan Michael: Welcome to today's lecture and interactive session here with a dear friend of mine and a real pioneer in the field of Jewish-Christian relations, which is our subject matter. Dr. Marvin Wilson has just been a beloved biblical scholar, teacher, and a much-sought-after speaker. I consider him one of the main pioneers in the field of Evangelical Jewish relations.

Dr. Wilson has a PhD from Brandeis University, and he taught at Gordon College for over 50 years, where he was the Harold J. Ockenga Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies. He was a translator for the New International Version of the Bible. I remember first learning of Dr. Wilson many years ago through his series of three books that he wrote on Evangelical Jewish relations and co-authored with rabbis and Jewish scholars.

Then, of course, his book that we are using, and many others do, as a textbook in our course called Introduction to Israel. That book is entitled Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith. That book has been used in many schools and has really helped to shape Jewish-Christian relations for decades now. So, Dr. Wilson, a very warm welcome and thank you so much for giving of your time today. I think it's a real privilege for those listening and for the students of the course to be able to meet you in person here by video and to learn firsthand from you. So thank you so much.

Dr. Marvin Wilson: Thank you, Susan. It certainly is a delight to be with you today and to give this lecture on Christian Jewish relations today. There is so much in this area, it is such a rich topic. So, where would you like to begin?

Dr. Susan Michael: Yes, well, it is. It goes back 2,000 years, but we're not going to try to cover that today. We're really looking at more of the modern relationship and from the Holocaust forward. I think the Holocaust was a real momentous occasion that really woke up Jewish-Christian relations. So, what are some of the developments that you've seen specifically tied to the Holocaust and its impact on different segments of the church?

Dr. Marvin Wilson: You're exactly right. The Holocaust has had a tremendous impact on Christian Jewish relations. To try to hit some of the high points on what has gone on, first, the Holocaust shook the very credibility of Christianity. It called into accountability whether Christianity was being displayed in this horrendous period of time from 1933 to '45, which scholars typically refer to as the Holocaust years.

While most Jews look at the New Testament and feel, although most have not read it, that the New Testament is anti-Semitic because actually Christians were acting not as Christians, the assumption was maybe you can't get from the New Testament directly to Auschwitz. But nevertheless, the long history of contempt and anti-Judaism, which has been there for many years, provided the seed in that soil which in Europe eventually led to the Holocaust. The Holocaust, in short, did not happen in a vacuum.

The Jewish perception has been, "Well, if Christians allowed those horrible things of hatred and violence to happen in so-called Christian Europe, then Christianity must be anti-Semitic." As one rabbi put it very painfully to me a number of years ago, he said, "Wilson, if loving Jesus caused those European Christians to do all those horrible things to us Jews, then thank you very much, we Jews can do without your Jesus."

That was a horrible indictment to hear, but what the rabbi was reflecting on was really the silence of the church, which is the second important lesson we learn from the Holocaust. This alarming indifference to evil, the apathy, the inaction of Christians, as one survivor likes to put it to me, the bystanders are the people I really have the problem with when it comes to the Holocaust because most Christians very frankly did not love their neighbors as themselves and intervene in ways they could intervene. While the issues of the Holocaust are complex, the apathy and indifference, as Heschel once said, indifference to evil is more insidious than evil itself. That is a difficult thing that came out of the Holocaust.

Third, the Holocaust raised the question for Jews: can we Jews really trust Christians? This is one of the carry-overs today when we deal with Christian Jewish relations. Is there still that nagging doubt in the deep psyche of the Jewish community? Can you really trust Christians? Because few Christians, today the Jewish community refers to those who did reach out and try to help Jews, righteous gentiles, but they were very few.

Fourth, the Holocaust showed that the church's long teaching of triumphalism, supersessionism, or replacement theology had taken its toll. When Jews are told by Christians, "You have no more sacred vocation, God is done with you, the church is the second stage of the salvation rocket, you have fizzled out, you have no more integrity with God, and we have replaced you in the plan of God." Christian triumphalism therefore made Jews fear. If Christians have replaced us and we have no more voice, and indeed as they force us into the ghettos of Europe—visit Vienna someday, visit other places in Italy—Christians had controlled them and Jews had feared Christians.

A fifth important lesson that emerged from the Holocaust is it revealed we have been really ignorant one of the other. Christians and Jews have passed like ships in the night. We really don't know until we've deeply taken time to look into each other's community, meet with each other, share with each other, do serious reading and education of the other. Unfortunately, the church and the synagogue had accepted misunderstandings and stereotypes and misperceptions. Jews, for example, equated Christian missions with violence. Now, all of us know good Christian mission does not involve violence, but Jews largely had witnessed an aberrant Christianity. They begged, if you will, "Will the true and the real Christianity please stand up?" The Holocaust, you see, exposed the need for genuine Christianity to be practiced.

I think a sixth thing the Holocaust showed: millions of Christians had believed a lie. What lie did these Christians believe? Hitler and his minions said, "We've got to purify the human race. Jews are only lice in our fur to be exterminated. They are Untermenschen," that is they are sub-human. Instead of seeing the Jewish people as those into whom the church has been engrafted, this idea of the Aryans being the master race required some very deep Christian introspection, Christian repentance following the Holocaust years. The church had believed a lie.

One or two final things about the Holocaust and how it's impacted Christian Jewish relation. It also exposed the need for Christians to understand and appreciate the fact that Christianity is Jewish. Because Christians did not affirm their roots in the Jewish people, and the Jewish roots of the Christian faith were not affirmed, therefore Christians had little regard for these people, the Jewish people. Instead of a spirit of appreciation, indebtedness, thankfulness—thank you because everything that's changed our lives, our Bible, our Lord, our doctrine, our understanding of ethics, morality, spirituality, all of these are among the gifts of the Jews that have impacted every Christian today.

An eighth thing is today certain Christians are historical revisionists or distortionists, as a Jewish friend likes to put it to me, who minimize or like to deny the facts of the Holocaust. "Oh, the ovens were just for baking bread," and other myths that are ridiculous. These kinds of things call the sincerity of Christians into question. If Christians are saying these kinds of things today, Jews again wonder, "Can we really trust Christians? How honest are they even about the facts of history and trying to deny the Holocaust?"

Finally, the years following the Holocaust showed many Christians can self-correct and change. That's one of the pluses in the decades following the Holocaust. One Orthodox rabbi from New York said to me recently, he said, "We see today many Christians who are willing to face history and to look at this horrendous period of time and to make adjustments, to make changes in their thinking and their perceptions of the Jewish people." That's a good thing to know as we move forward. There are Christians today that say the church blew it during the Holocaust, and today we want to make reparations. One of the first things we can do is in Christian Jewish relations and to not look at Jews from a distance, but care enough to come to know Jews. How can you say we love our neighbor as ourselves if we've never taken the time to understand and meet and know our neighbor as ourselves? Those are some of the highlights of what I think the Holocaust has shown for Christian Jewish relations today.

Dr. Susan Michael: Well, thank you. There are really many lessons that we could learn from the Holocaust and you've listed them very well. Whereas most of our audience and our students are probably of the Protestant or Evangelical tradition, I think it's important for them to know the specific impact that this had on the Catholic Church. I think that there are some lessons there for all of us.

Dr. Marvin Wilson: Well, the Catholic Church has undergone some tremendous rethinking and made changes in light of the Holocaust. Liturgy in the Catholic Church that referred, for instance, on Good Friday to the "perfidious Jews." Catholics have had to go back and to look at their history and their liturgy and these experiences. They did a mea culpa. They had a confession of wrong.

This all came to a head under the leadership of Pope John XXIII. Pope John XXIII called what we call today the Second Vatican Council, or simply Vatican II. In that council, he issued, and the scholars who worked with him and hierarchy in the Catholic Church, they issued a document called Nostra Aetate. In that document, we have a statement given for non-Christian religions, but particularly focused on the Jewish people. It was a landmark call to re-examine, to reform, to reverse a 2,000-year history.

What were some of the features in that Nostra Aetate document? Well, the first thing is very important: God's covenant with Israel continues. Many Christians had written that covenant off. Secondly, it called for productive dialogue between Catholics and Jews. Thirdly, there was a new appreciation of the Jewish scriptures, emphasis on teaching and preaching from the Hebrew Bible or the Christian Old Testament. Finally, there was a call for the re-examination of what the Catholic Church came to call the teaching of contempt, the charge, for instance, of deicide—putting God to death literally, but deicide, that Jews had been blamed for centuries for killing Christ. Does that charge then remain with the Jewish people? This teaching of contempt had to be faced honestly and dealt with.

Vatican II did provide a very positive transformative frame of reference or framework to move forward. Today we see the Conference of Catholic Bishops being useful in helping to further the effects of Nostra Aetate. There are a number of local parish priests who've taken it upon themselves to reach out to the Jewish community. One of my favorites was Father Ed Flannery, who wrote the well-known book The Anguish of the Jews, which was an utter revelation to him as he began to study this history of Catholic-Jewish relations. The other final thing I'd say about the Catholics: they are working through some of their Catholic schools, which have Jewish and Catholic study centers that provide programs and special lectures. Boston College has a fine center where this is being done. Merrimack College in Massachusetts is another college. Down in Florida, Saint Leo University on the West Coast of Florida also has a program to instruct people and to keep Vatican II before people as hopefully these changes will continue. But some good things have happened, there's a lot more work to do as they say, for both Catholics as well as Protestants.

Dr. Susan Michael: But I think it's astounding that the Catholic Church did such an introspection even to the point of changing their liturgy. I know that the Conference of Catholic Bishops published a little booklet and it had statements of repentance by the various bishops across Europe. Those statements were really moving for me. I thought they were some of the most beautiful verbiage I'd ever read of repenting towards the Jewish people. So I think it's been quite astounding. Now, the largest Protestant church there under the nose of the Holocaust, of course, were the Lutherans. What have you seen taking place there within the Lutheran community after the Holocaust?

Dr. Marvin Wilson: Yes, of course, the Lutherans were a dominant Protestant church in Germany and in other parts of Europe. Several decades after the Holocaust, the Lutheran Church began to become very uncomfortable. Being uncomfortable, they said, "What can we do?" So they decided to issue a statement, a statement which disassociated themselves with these horrendous teachings of Martin Luther, saying, "These are not the Luther we want to be remembered for as being Lutherans." So there was a disassociation of themselves with those remarks.

That began to catch on also with many other mainline Protestant groups: the Episcopalians, the United Church of Christ, the United Methodists, the United Presbyterians. These other churches began to issue statements also about the Jewish people and Judaism. These documents mainly renounced anti-Semitism. These documents mainly spoke out against supersessionism and called for a stronger emphasis on the preaching of the Old Testament and on Jewish roots of the Christian faith. They tried also to emphasize more things like the Jewish context for the life and teachings of Jesus and a call for an improvement of Christian-Jewish relations.

Even before Evangelical-Jewish relations began, a lot of the mainline churches were moving in this direction within a decade or so after the Holocaust years and then many of these denominations eventually issuing statements. How would we summarize then the Lutherans and mainline Protestants? Well, Jews look at all of this and they would say, "Well, we're very pleased that none of these statements by mainline denominations call for the conversion of the Jewish people." They do not have programs for the conversion of the Jewish people.

But Jews look at those documents and they feel uncomfortable and with great concern and dismay because those documents do not strongly support the State of Israel. Certainly for large numbers of people in the Jewish community, when you talk about what's dear to the heart of a Jew, in liturgy, in daily prayer, in how they invest their money and support and so forth, Israel cannot be separated from the Jewish psyche. Instead, many of these mainline denominations ended up having almost singular focus on the rights of the Palestinian peoples. Yes, they do have their rights, but these statements—some of them went as far as saying we have to issue sanctions, we have to issue boycotts, we have to issue divestment instructions for investments. These are the things that have disturbed the Jewish community.

Mainstream denominations create a somewhat of a paradox for the Jewish people. They are not the people most Jews in America look to today as the natural people who love the word of God and out of the word of God they learn to love the people of the book. Who are the people of the book? They are the Israelites, they are the Hebrews, they are the Jewish people as we come into the New Testament. The Evangelical movement, being a Bible-centered movement, the Jewish people have, I think, more naturally come into focus for Evangelicals. Maybe that leads us to another point we could talk about, Susan: what's been happening in the last half century among Evangelicals and Jews? Does that sound like a good topic for a few minutes here?

Dr. Susan Michael: Yes, absolutely. I think you've really given us a broad array of the impact that the Holocaust had on these segments of Christianity. So now we do want to look forward and the blossoming relationship of Jews and Evangelicals over the last 50 years. So please, continue.

Dr. Marvin Wilson: I think one of the reasons the relationship has blossomed, Israel has been a key to that. In 1967, there was an event that happened that really caught the Evangelical community's attention. Not every church, but many, many Christians who read scripture and realize that God made an eternal covenant with Abraham and something seemed to be happening prophetically, perhaps, or maybe God guiding history providentially and bringing these people home, redeeming them from the four corners of the earth where they could have self-determination and assert their own rights where the nations of the earth did not usually become a good host for them where they were discriminated against.

Evangelical Christians saw the Jewish people after June of '67 now moving into West Jerusalem, seeing the Western Wall, the holiest spot on earth in the city of Jerusalem where Jews come to pray, this is now in the hands of Israel. This led to a lot of thinking and speculation. What might God be doing in Israel today? While we have no consensus among all Christians today what God is doing in Israel today, I think you have to be pretty stone cold and calloused not to recognize some very powerful and wonderful things are happening in that land. In what way might they fulfill specific prophecies? Well, Christians have considerable differences of opinion just like the Jewish community does.

But one thing, that's why Evangelical-Jewish relations began to grow, because Evangelicals saw the wonderful things, stories of these things happening, they were reading about them. Now we got to take our Bibles and come over and see the land. So they would come to the land and tourism began to grow as they visited the land. Of course, the Evangelical church has invested more tourism dollars than any other religious group in the world in coming to see this miracle astride the Mediterranean, the land of Israel.

Christian Zionist organizations began to develop in the land of Israel. Susan, you work for the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, certainly one of the strongest and most vibrant of these. You work with others in the land, like Bridges for Peace and Christian Friends of Israel, and there are others. These Christian Zionist organizations provided a means by which, even though Christians live around the world, they can take part in these events in Israel. Because Christian organizations like ICEJ, they are the boots on the ground in Israel, ministering to Israel in very positive ways, in social justice and in helping with the poor of the community, in assisting in a whole list of things, and that's your area. But these Christian Zionist organizations became ways in which people living in the States can connect with Israel, get news from Israel, and build a bonding with Israel.

This helped Evangelical Christians in wanting to build relationships with Jewish people. They were envious of people like your group, Susan, who could live in Israel and every day build relationships with these people through whom God was doing something new. That was exciting to many Evangelicals who did not see God being dead, but very much alive and doing this new thing, albeit a very difficult thing sometimes to fully put your hands on it.

In my last chapter of Our Father Abraham, I talk about what I have learned from over 450 field trips with my students into the Jewish community. We live within, on campus, eight to ten synagogues within a twelve-mile radius, which took me 20 years to open these synagogues to our students. I usually would bring them, but they're open, our students visit now, to come anytime they want on their own or come with a class. We learn together, we become educated together. We attend Jewish holidays, Shabbat meetings, we go to Jewish community centers, we visit Jewish funeral homes, we go to Holocaust centers where we meet survivors. So many opportunities the Jewish community has just opened up to us.

If you're patient and if you come with the right motives to engage the Jewish community and you're there primarily to learn and to do a lot of listening, I think this is where Jews come to have a changing perception of Evangelicals where they realize that Evangelicals indeed can be friends they can count on because they are people who are there to learn and they have a Jewish heart. They are here to, as in Israel we say, "nachamu, nachamu ami," comfort ye, comfort ye my people.

We have many rabbis that come to our college and speak. They in turn have invited me, Hasidic, Orthodox, Reform, Conservative. I've spoken in many, many synagogues in New England and outside of New England. I think this openness to invite each other into each other's house of worship, when I started doing this dialogue over 50 years ago, most Jews would not want to enter a church. It was just too painful after the Holocaust. But today there are more and more Jews that are coming in their friendships with Christians even to appreciate things going on.

Dr. Susan Michael: Well, Dr. Wilson, I will say that very few Christian leaders have had the amount of interaction with the Jewish community that you have had or have built that solid reciprocal relationship of mutual respect and open doors. I'm very aware that it also took many years, decades, to develop that relationship. I want to emphasize for those listening to this that it is a relationship. It doesn't happen overnight, and it's something that you build and it takes time. A lot of our ones listening to you will be visiting a synagogue or would love to visit a synagogue, would love to initiate a relationship where there is none. So what would be your advice and guidance to them, how to begin a relationship with their Jewish community?

Dr. Marvin Wilson: Right. I think when we deal with each other, we want to be honest, we want to be straightforward about why we want to come to visit. I think the primary point for Christians wanting to meet and befriend Jews is we need the education which many of them can provide for us in giving us a much deeper appreciation of the Hebrew Bible and prayer, love for Israel, how to perform social justice acts in the community to make a difference. While theologically Christians and Jews differ the most, even those areas, if we talk about them with respectful conversation, that can be done.

In fact, that's a change I've noticed in 50 years. Never from a pulpit would I have heard the word Jesus in a synagogue. Now I can point out several synagogues, if I have a group of Christian students visiting with me, rabbis sometimes make comments about Jesus, a parallel teaching he might have given to a point the rabbi's making in a sermon and other things. So I think when we come, we have a lot to learn because while most Christians might think they score fairly high in their knowledge of the first 2,000 years of Jewish history from Abraham to Jesus, sadly most Christians don't score very high on their knowledge of Judaism from Jesus—that is from Second Temple Judaism through Rabbinic Judaism into its modern expressions. Therefore, many Christians make a mistake when they're visiting synagogues; they try to hear everything through the eyes of the Old Testament.

Judaism today emerged from that religion. There is no more temple, there are no more priests, there are no more animal sacrifice. Judaism has reinterpreted many of these things and they have more modern counterparts where the spirit of some of these things continue to be carried up. But these are the things particularly that we can learn. I would say also another prerequisite is to have a humble spirit. Sadly, the history of our relationship from the Christian point of view has often been one of triumphalism, arrogance, superiority, and pride. These have been great barriers to effective Christian Jewish relation.

The Christian's posture when we begin Christian Jewish relations is that of being a servant, of being a listener, of being teachable. That way we can learn as we go along, rather than coming, "We have all the answers for somebody else." No, this is the joy of learning with Jewish people. Jews have an awful lot to teach Christians and Christians need to acknowledge this. We Christians have things that Jews can learn from. I've pointed out one or two rabbis in my book who point out things they see so positive about Christian interaction and they feel Jews can learn from this.

But as we do this together, we're seeking to build a better world together in which God's love, God's justice, God's peace can be found in the world. If you want to be successful in dialogue, have time for personal study and education. Study is at the heart of Hebraic heritage. Build a personal library of books. Begin to do this, books on Judaism, books on the history of the Jewish people, books on the roots of Christianity that run very, very deep into Jewish soil.

How do you build good relationships? Well, point number one, and I think that's close to your heart, Susan, I would tell people, go to Israel as soon as you can. As soon as possible. You'll be glad you did. The Bible will come to life. The trip will change your life. Not only will you read the Bible differently, but it will give you a new perspective on the Holocaust, on modern Israel, and the church living in Israel.

Speak out against anti-Semitism in your community. Few people are doing that this day. Anti-Semitism is on the increase. Be aware of what's happening in the world today. If you could be one voice that speaks out against hatred of another people, you are an instrument of God. Jews are going to find out who this person is who's not of our community who's writing the letter of protest, who's painting over the graffiti that was put on a synagogue. It lets Jews know they are not alone. As the former editor of Christianity Today once put it, "To attack Jews is to attack Christians," and we Evangelicals ought to be feeling that pain and standing beside Jewish people.

Finally, I would say learn to love unconditionally when we engage in interfaith relations. There are no preconditions and no prerequisites to Evangelical-Jewish friendships. We simply come together and want to be used by the spirit of God and be led of the spirit of God. We are called to love with no strings attached. The Lord bless all you students as you're out there growing in your knowledge and your love of Israel and your love for the Jewish people. It's worth it all and you will be blessed by it in return.

Dr. Susan Michael: Well, I hope you enjoyed that interview and I want to remind you again, we linked to Dr. Marvin Wilson's book Our Father Abraham in today's show notes. Be sure and get a copy of this. This is the textbook on Jewish-Christian relations and if this is something of interest to you, then you must have that book. So I will see you back here next week as we continue our series on Jews and Christians learning to relate. Until then, God bless.

And I want to offer you a free download. We have a download, 10 Reasons to Stand with Israel—actually, it's 10 Reasons Why Christians Should Stand with Israel. Get your free download by going to the link in today's show note or go to www.outofzionshow.com and click on the tab for resources. We'll have it there as well. But be sure, download this free resource for you. We're going to be talking about some of the points in it in the coming weeks, so we want to make sure that you have it. You can print it out, you can share it with friends and family. Invite them to join us here on the Out of Zion Show for our Israel Answers series. So we'll see you back here next week. Until then, God bless.

Announcer: We hope you have enjoyed this episode of Out of Zion with Susan Michael. Be sure to subscribe to Out of Zion now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, pray.com, Salem OnePlace, Salem Life Audio. Out of Zion with Susan Michael is a production of ICEJ USA. All rights reserved.