Anti-Semitism

 

This a series of posts explores anti-Semitism, its origins, the motivations behind it, its various manifestations, its consequences, and its possible future. The series also proposes a method for determining when an act or statement is anti-Semitic and concludes with some suggestions for remedying the consequences of anti-Semitism. A series of discussion questions is also included.

 

Review of the previous post.

The previous post, post number 15 of 33 was the fourth post in a series of eight posts discussing other causes of anti-Semitism and focused on the New Testament.

 

Preview of this post.

This post, post number 16 of 33, is the fifth post in the series of eight posts discussing other causes of anti-Semitism and focuses on Christian church fathers.

Other Causes

 

 

 

This post discusses the role of the Christian Church in anti-Semitism. In particular, this post discusses the role of the Church Fathers.

 

THE CHURCH FATHERS

 

The Hellenization of Christianity

 

Were it not for the teachings of Paul, it is possible that the early Nazarene movement might have survived in an atmosphere of coexistence among their fellow Jews. Aside from questions concerning the Messiahship of Jesus, there were no great conflicts. With the emergence of the early Catholic Church, there lies a vast chasm between it and primitive Christianity. A complete metamorphosis is seen as the teachings of Jesus became a theological system. The spontaneous enthusiasm of the first age of Christianity has been replaced with a highly organized Church system with authority, creeds, and a canon of scriptures. The religion of Jesus has been replaced by a religion of blessings, which are received only through sacraments, which are given only by the priests. The key to this transformation is Hellenization.

When primitive Christianity broke from Judaism, it was immediately exposed to a world teaming with the Greek, Persian, and Egyptian cults. As Paul and other early missionaries sought new converts, it is not difficult to see how they would naturally and even unconsciously begin to utilize accepted terms in the propagation of their message. It also seems logical to assume that these new converts already had other religious ideas, which they brought with them as they came into the new faith.

The mystery religions which were rampant in the Greek world at that time became the medium in which Christianity patterned itself. “The chief mysteries were Eleusinian, Dionysiac, and Orphic (Greek); Isis, Serapis, and Osiris (Egyptian); Mithra (Persian); and Adonis or Tammuz (Syrian). These cults offered man salvation through faith and sacrament. Their devotees conquered sin by obtaining a state of ecstasy or enthusiasm in which they became united mystically with the Savior…God.”³² There seems to be a striking resemblance to the Pauline experience called “in Christ.” As Christianity grew, the moral message of Jesus was lost sight of as the mystery of his person became the prime consideration. And as Christianity became more Hellenized and separated from Judaism, it spread more rapidly.

The Canonization of the New Testament

During the quarter-century following the death of Jesus, nothing seems to have been written about his ministry or teachings. At first the sayings of Jesus were written in Aramaic, then later in Greek. The first Gospel was that of Mark, written about 70 C.E., to be followed by those of Matthew and Luke. By the end of the century, Paul’s letters had also acquired scriptural status.

There were two reasons for making a new body of scripture. One was the natural desire for a document that would record the events that were happening and to distinguish the new faith from the Jewish religion. The other basic reason for canonization was to separate the orthodox or genuine from the heterogeneous mass of literature that had begun to accumulate in the first two centuries.

The process of canonization was determined by two factors: one was automatic and the other arbitrary. Along with the Hebrew Bible, certain books were being used in the services of worship. These books which were read purely for edification were automatically included. “Among the books cited as being regularly used in the period from 100 to 170 C.E. were the Four Gospels, Acts, the Letters of Paul, I Peter and I John.”

The years 220-400 C.E. saw the acceptance of the above list, plus those books which up to this time had been almost universally rejected, such as James, II Peter, II and III John, Jude, Hebrews, and Revelation. On the other hand, several other books which had previously been regarded as canon were rejected. These include Barnabas, Hermas, the Didacha, and I Clement. The authorities of this closing period were Origen from Alexandria; Cyprian, the Bishop of Carthage; Eusebius, the Christian Historian of Caesarea; and Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria. In 367 they issued for the first time a canonical list that was the same as the present New Testament. Jerome used this same list for his later translation. In 397 the Council of Carthage ratified the list and it became canonized.

From this brief outline, it appears that the canonization of the New Testament was purely a human process. The Church was to teach that scripture was an infallible revelation and divinely predetermined, which discouraged any later objective and scholarly investigation from within its own ranks.

 

The Emergence of the Catholic Church

 

By the year 300 C.E., the clergy had become a distinct class. It was organized on an hierarchical basis of deacons, presbyters, and bishops. It held complete authority over the laity. When the Council of Constantinople in 381 made the bishop of the principal cities “patriarchs,” the Roman bishop refused the title and called himself “Pope” and “Visible Head of the Church.”

As Christianity evolved into the Catholic Church, there was much disagreement about the nature of Christ. The Latin view of Cyprian and Tertullian identified Christ with God as co-equal and co-eternal. On the other hand, the Greek or Eastern Church was divided. The Alexandrian school held Christ to be of the same substance as that of the Father, whereas the Antiochian school subordinated Christ to the Father. The controversy became so intense that Constantine convened the Nicean Council in 325 C.E. This was made possible by the recognition of Christianity as the official religion of the Empire by Constantine in the Edict of Milan in 313. “The so-called Nicean Creed as used today was the one probably adopted at the Council of Constantinople in 381.” The Nicean formula decided once and for all the oneness of Father and Son, and it pronounce anathemas on all those who did not accept it. The Latin theologians of the Western Church had prevailed, their leaders were Tertullian, Cyprian, and Augustine.

Tertullian (150-225 C.E.), presbyter of Carthage, had been trained for the Law. His approach was rigid and legal. His reasonings were…”Only those who were baptized and followed the prescribed course of penitence could hope for release from punishment” and “Divine revelation not reason is the source of all truth.”

Cyprian (200-258 C.E.), bishop of Carthage, had been a pupil of Tertullian. He is credited with the much quoted phrase “Outside the Church, there is no salvation.” “He instigated the Lord’s Supper as a magical rite and the practice of celibacy.”

Augustine (354-430 C.E.), bishop of Hippo in North Africa, became the Father of Roman Catholic thought. He believed that man’s citizenship was already in heaven, and the present life is but a prelude to the heavenly life. But heaven is only for those who God has chosen. Some are predetermined, others are not.

Leo the Great in the fifth century and Gregory the Great in the sixth century, gave Augustine the official stamp of approval. The transition to the Catholic Church was now fairly complete. Sacrament was now central to the religion and it was grounded in authority. Any inquiry into the basis of the faith was not permitted.

By the fifth century, Christianity had rejected the rationalization of the Greeks. It turned it’s back on tolerance and rational thinking, embracing legalism, dogma, authority, and sacramentalism. The rejection of Hellenism was to bring on a thousand years of darkness.

 

The Anti-Semitism of the Church Fathers

 

The war of the Christian Church against the Jews began with the Church Fathers’ relentless attacks on those Jews who stubbornly refused to accept Jesus as Messiah. “The unbridled utterances of bigotry and hate coming from the venerated Church Fathers of the early Christian Church raises some doubt as to both their sanity and their saintliness.”³⁷ Despite their belief that Christ’s death was necessary and predestined, they denounced the Jews as a “condemned race and hated of God.”

For example, in the writings of the Church Fathers, the authoritative Christian theologians after the New Testament period, this accusation appears with even more clarity and force. One of the Church Fathers, Justin Martyr (middle of the second century), explains to his Jewish interlocutor why the Jews have suffered exile and the destruction of their Temple: these “tribulations were justly imposed on you since you have murdered the Just One” (Dialogue with Trypho, chapter 16).

Throughout classical and medieval times this theme is found in Christian literature and drama. For example, in a 12th-century religious drama, entitled The Mystery of Adam, the biblical King Solomon addresses the Jews, prophesying that they will eventually kill the son of God. Here is a rhyming English translation from the original Norman French and Latin:

 

This saying shall be verified
When God’s own Son for us hath died
The masters of the law [i.e. the Pharisees or rabbis] ’twill be
That slay him most unlawfully;
Against all justice, all belief,
They’ll crucify Him, like a thief.
But they will lose their lordly seat,
Who envy him, and all entreat.
Low down they’ll come from a great height,
Well may they mourn their mournful plight.
(Translation from Frank Talmage’s Disputation and Dialogue)

 

Before expounding further on the anti-Semitism of the Fathers, it is only fair to mention that from the days of Paul onward, there was considerable anti-Christian hostility from among the orthodox Jews because of the claims of Christianity. Because the rapidly growing Church was becoming a real threat to Judaism, fear and hatred of Christianity would not be surprising. It is quite possible that the Jews may have aided and even instigated the early Roman persecution of the Christians in the first few centuries.

Because of the growing power of the Church, Christian theology and the Church Fathers were to become more and more obsessed with Jewish guilt. The following teachings of the Fathers were to be handed down throughout succeeding generations in Christendom. Origen (185-254 C.E.) echoed the growing hostility:

“On account of their unbelief and other insults which they heaped upon Jesus, the Jews will not only suffer more than others in the judgment which is believed to impend over the world, but have even already endured such sufferings. For what nation is in exile from their own metropolis, and from the place sacred to the worship of their fathers, save the Jews alone? And the calamities they have suffered because they were a most wicked nation, which although guilty of many other sins, yet has been punished so severely for none as for those that were committed against our Jesus.”

The Church, who was now Israel, had to discredit the other Israel. And it did so by making anti-Jewish theology an integral part of Christian apologetics. The Fathers turned out volumes of literature to prove that they were the true people of God, and that Judaism had only been a prelude to or in preparation for Christianity. Justin Martyr along with Hippolytus (170-236 C.E.) was obsessed with the belief that the Jews were receiving and would continue to receive God’s punishment for having murdered Jesus. Hippolytus writes:

“Now then, incline thine ear to me and hear my words, and give heed, thou Jew. Many a time does thou boast thyself, in that thou didst condemn Jesus of Nazareth to death, and didst give him vinegar and gall to drink; and thou dost vaunt thyself because of this. Come, therefore, and let us consider together whether perchance thou dost boast unrighteously, O, Israel, and whether thou small portion of vinegar and gall has not brought down this fearful threatening upon thee and whether this is not the cause of thy present condition involved in these myriad of troubles.”

As the Church came into power in the fourth century, it turned on the synagogues with even greater intensity. Jewish civil and religious status was deteriorating, thanks to the influence the bishops had in the political arena. Laws were passed making it a capital offense for any Jew to make a convert, they were excluded from various professions, denied all civil honors, and their autonomy of worship was being threatened. In every way, they were being discriminated against. Christians felt that their belief in divine punishment was now supported by this growing evidence.

Hilary of Potieres spoke of the Jews as “a people who had always persisted in iniquity and out of its abundance of evil glorified in wickedness.” Ambrose defended a fellow bishop for burning a synagogue at Callinicum and asked “who cares if a synagogue – home of insanity and unbelief – is destroyed?”⁴² Gregory of Nyssa (331-396 C.E.) gave the following indictment:

“Slayers of the Lord, murderers of the prophets, adversaries of God, men who show contempt for the Law, foes of grace, enemies of their fathers’ faith, advocates of the Devil, brood of vipers, slanderers, scoffers, men whose minds are in darkness, leaven of the Pharisees, assembly of demons, sinners, wicked men, stoners, and haters of righteousness.”

The strongest attacks on Jews and Judaism by the Church Fathers are to be found in the Homilies of John Chrysostom (347-407 C.E.) in his Antioch sermons. He is considered to be among the most beloved and admired in Church history. His name translates in Greek as St. John the Golden Mouthed. His discourses were prompted by the fact that many Christians were meeting on friendly terms with Jews, visiting Jewish homes, and attending their synagogues. Chrysostom said:

“The Jews sacrifice their children to Satan….they are worse than wild beasts. The synagogue is a brothel, a den of scoundrels, the temple of demons devoted to idolatrous cults, a criminal assembly of Jews, a place of meeting for the assassins of Christ, a house of ill fame, a dwelling of iniquity, a gulf and abyss of perdition.”

“The Jews have fallen into a condition lower than the vilest animal. Debauchery and drunkenness have brought them to the level of the lusty goat and the pig. They know only one thing: to satisfy their stomachs, to get drunk, to kill, and beat each other up like stage villains and coachmen.”

“The synagogue is a curse, obstinate in her error, she refuses to see or hear, she has deliberately perverted her judgment; she has extinguished with herself the light of the Holy Spirit.”

Chrysostom further said that the Jews had become a degenerate race because of their “odious assassination of Christ for which crime there is no expiation possible, no indulgence, no pardon, and for which they will always be a people without a nation, enduring a servitude without end.”

He elaborated further on God’s punishment of the Jews:

“But it was men, says the Jew, who brought these misfortunes upon us, not God. On the contrary, it was in fact God who brought them about. If you attribute them to men, reflect again that even supposing men had dared, they could not have had the power to accomplish them, unless it had been God’s will…Men would certainly not have made war unless God had permitted them…Is it not obvious that it was because God hated you and rejected you once for all?”

On another occasion Chrysostom is quoted as saying “I hate the Jews because they violate the Law. I hate the synagogue because it has the Law and the prophets. It is the duty of all Christians to hate the Jews.”

Chrysostom’s Homilies were to be used in seminaries and schools for centuries as model sermons, with the result that his message of hate would be passed down to succeeding generations of theologians. The nineteenth century Protestant cleric R. S. Storr called him “one of the most eloquent preachers who ever since apostolic times have brought to men the divine tidings of truth and love.” A contemporary of Storr, the great theologian John Henry Cardinal Newman, described Chrysostom as a “bright, cheerful, gentle soul, a sensitive heart…”

Augustine, the great theologian, was also guilty of the growing hatred. In a sermon on Catechumens, he says:

“The Jews hold him, the Jews insult him, the Jews bind him, crown him with thorns, dishonor him with spitting, scourge him, overwhelm with revilings, hang him upon the tree, pierce him with a spear…The Jews killed him.”

“But when the Jews killed Christ, though they knew it not, they prepared the supper for us.”

In another sermon he characterized the Jews as “willfully blind to Holy Scripture,” “lacking in understanding” and “haters of truth.”

The Church Fathers had sown the seeds of intolerance and Jews were to become the object of hatred and persecution all over Europe for centuries to come.

It might also be noted that Christian anti-Semitism is not simply a shameful blemish on the early Church, but is an underlying element of its theology that has endured through the centuries and into modern times. It is tragic that in later times even the well-known Church reformer, Martin Luther[1], was finally seduced by all the anti-Jewish propaganda of his time. Although in his earlier ministry Luther sympathetically acknowledged the shameful way the Church had treated the Jews and urged kind treatment of them, in later life he was to write the complete opposite. Here in part is what Luther wrote in C.E. 1543. Note that Adolf Hitler seemed to use it as a general guide for implementing the earlier phase of his “final solution” against the Jews:

“What then shall we Christians do with this damned, rejected race of Jews? Since they live among us and we know about their lying and n and cursing, we cannot tolerate them if we do not wish to share in their lies, curses, and blasphemy . . . . .We must prayerfully and reverentially practice a merciful severity. . . . . Let me give you my honest advice:

First, to set fire to their synagogues[2] or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our LORD and of Christendom.

Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed.

Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them.

Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb.

Fifth, I advise that safe conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside, since they are not lords, officials, tradesmen, or the like. Let them stay at home. [We might well ask “What home?”, since they were all presumably burned in point two!]

Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them, and put aside for safe keeping.

Seventh, I recommend putting a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hand of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow.  

It might be worth noting that from 1937 to 1941, Germany was between approximately 75% to 80%  Protestant (Lutheran). One wonders what these people were being taught in Church about the Jews prior to the Holocaust, and did it spill over to their views of Jews in Germany prior to and during the Holocaust so they sympathized with the anti-Semitism, Jew Hatred, embodied in Nazism?

Even into modern times, passion plays–large outdoor theatrical productions that portray the end of Jesus’ life, often with a cast of hundreds–have continued to perpetuate the idea that Jews killed Jesus and are to be reviled and hated.

 

Preview of the next post.

The next post, post number 17 of 33, is the sixth post in the series of eight posts discussing other causes of anti-Semitism and focuses on teaching in Judaism.

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[1] For a more detailed account of Martin Luther, see Martin Luther, Renegade and Prophet, by Lyndal Roper, Random House, 2017.

 

[2] See also, St. Ambrose of Milan who also instigated the burning of a synagogue as being “a house of impiety, a receptacle of folly which God Himself has condemned”.

 

 

 

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