Theology Today - Vol 32, No. 4 - January 1976 - EDITORIAL

397 - Zionism and Christians

Zionism and Christians
By John Deedy

By the time this essay is read, history will have been written on the Arab-sponsored resolution in the United Nations that would equate Zionism with racism and racial discrimination, and perhaps we will be seeing whether the action results-as United States Chief Delegate to the United Nations, Daniel P. Moynihan, threatened it could-in "some buffer" being placed between Washington and the world body. Also, we may be seeing whether that resolution, as adopted, results in some buffer being put between Jews and Christians, primarily because of the indifferent manner in which most Christians regarded the resolution. In late October, shortly after the resolution had cleared the United Nations' Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee for debate and decision in the General Assembly, Dr. Joseph P. Sternstein, president of the Zionist Organization of America, appealed to Christian churches to rally behind Jews and oppose the resolution. Christian response was not overwhelming, although the General Secretary of the National Council of Churches, Claire Randall called for rejection of the anti-Zionist resolution, and some sixty Christian participants at a national Christian-Jewish workshop in Memphis branded the resolution as "wholly inacceptable" and a "slander against Jews everywhere." At the grassroots, however, Christian emotions appeared to be not terribly disturbed.

For whatever reasons-whether it is Protestant dedication to the separation of church and state, Catholic leeriness because of the Papal States' history; and/or casualness born of the ambivalence of Christian church leaders, including Pope Paul himself-Christian attitudes as a whole have been anything but generous towards Israel. Jewry's idea of a spiritual homeland is lost on many Christians, as is the Jewish concept of an interwoven religious and national consciousness that makes the survival of Israel an absolute human and theological essential. Most Jews are mystified by this Christian inability or unwillingness to grasp their meaning of Israel, and of course they react bitterly to the criticism which flows-with surprising easiness, it sometimes seems-from ecumenical and otherwise friendly Christians toward Israel as political entity. The recently published book, The New Anti-Semitism, by Arnold Forster and Benjamin R. Epstein

John Deedy is Managing Editor of Commonweal and regularly writes articles on religion for The New York Times. He is the author of several books on American Catholicism and is currently working on a study of literary landmarks for Sheed and Ward.

398 - Zionism and Christians

(McGraw-Hill), itemizes a lengthy list of negative Christian attitudes and actions with respect to Israel. The offending parties, as seen by Mr. Forster and Mr. Epstein, are not merely the fundamentalist groups still caught up in the Deicide libel or poisoned by its byproducts, but rather some of the most respected figures of such mainstream churches as Episcopalianism and Roman Catholicism. Cited in the book, for example, is Dean Francis P. Sayre, Jr., of the National Episcopal Cathedral in Washington, D.C., and his 1972 Palm Sunday sermon criticizing Israeli policies in East Jerusalem. Cited also is Jesuit Father Daniel Berrigan for his talk in 1973 before the Association of Arab University Graduates, likewise in Washington. This was the talk in which Father Berrigan maintained that if he were a "conscientious Jew" living then in Israel, he would have to live much as he was living in the United States-that is, "in resistance against the state."

There was no "debate" within the Christian community about the anti-Zionist resolution in the United Nations, which is probably as well. It is impossible to conceive of such a debate clarifying Christian thinking on Zionism or contributing to Christian understanding of common Jewish identification with Israel. Very likely a "debate" would have engendered ill-will, for the blood pressures it would have raised, and the net result would be many more bad effects than good ones. On the other hand, it must be regretted that it was left largely to political spokesmen, notably Mr. Moynihan and Leonard Garment, a former White House official serving on the United States delegation to the United Nations, to make clarifications that were also the business of Christian church leaders. One thinks specifically of the anti-Semitic implications of the anti-Zionist resolution. Here Christian leaders could have-indeed, should have-exerted their teaching responsibilities. But the silence through the vote in committee was deafening, as one might say.

Zionism is the Jewish national movement that began at the end of the nineteenth century for purposes of eliminating what was viewed as the basic abnormality of Jewish existence-its ubiquitous minority status in the midst of other nations. In the United Nations debate, Mr. Garment described Zionism as a movement aimed at preserving "the small remnant of the Jewish people that survived the horrors of racial holocaust." Mr. Epstein broadened that to "a liberation movement for Jews which seeks to preserve the religious and cultural essence of the Jewish people." Michael Novak summed up all three notions when he wrote recently in Commonweal: "Zion is home, Zion is roots, Zion is heritage, Zion is identity. To be a Zionist is now virtually identical with being Jewish. . . ." In this context, the anti-Zionism of the Arab nations and their associates in and out of the United Nations becomes what many Jews see as the "ultimate anti-

399 - Zionism and Christians

Semitism" for the direct threat it poses to Israel. By extension, Christian indifference or insensitivity towards Israel, as well as Christian incapacity or unwillingness to comprehend the necessity of the existence of Israel to Jewish safety and survival throughout the world, becomes a manifestation of what some label the "new anti-Semitism."

The new anti-Semitism, as defined by authors Forster and Epstein, is such a subtle thing as to encompass many organizations and individuals who, they admit, would be shocked to think of themselves, or have others think them, anti-Semitic. At the same time, many of those encompassed within a Forster-Epstein definition would cry that they have been unfairly categorized. Father Berrigan-he, again, having been cited in their book-would undoubtedly be one of these. Even now, two years after his controversial appearance before the Association of Arab University Graduates, Father Berrigan energetically stresses that his criticism of Israel in that 1973 talk was not intended to be hostile and definitely not an expression of anti-Semitism, either latent or overt. Unquestionably he is insulted by any suggestion that his talk smacked of anti-Semitism. That many Jewish leaders refuse to back away from their initial negative impressions of the talk dramatizes the gap between Christian and Jewish thought processes on the meaning of Israel.

Father Berrigan amplified on the intent of that 1973 talk in a taped discussion conducted by Time magazine, but never published there. Win magazine, a publication concerned with peace and freedom through non-violent action, secured the tape, had it transcribed, and published more of Dan Berrigan on Israel in a recent issue. It is doubtful that many, or any, Jews will be won over by his additional comments, some of which follow:

"I was trying to suggest [in that 1973 talk] that a simple and basic idea had best be kept in mind; something like this: There's a crucial distinction between the people of the covenant, and indeed the whole prophetic and historic content of the Old Testament on the one band, and the State of Israel on the other. And that unless we kept such a distinction, and stated it firmly and publicly when required, we were only creating another sacred hegemony, technologized, armed to the teeth, automatically exempt from the criticism that should fall on any state. Especially when such a state has shown itself belligerent, propaganda ridden, and questionable in its violations of justice and human rights.

"Suddenly, say the critics, this effort to scrutinize, judge, speak the truth is wiped out; the State of Israel must be allowed to go its own way under some divine cover. Well, this was not only the attitude of many Jews, it was the main-line clamor from the Christians. And I say hogwash, theologically, humanly."

The interviewer asked Father Berrigan, "Isn't it difficult for Jews to look on Israel in the secular way you describe?" He responded:

"It's difficult for anyone to be impartial about his favorite place, his

400 - Zionism and Christians

people. The difficulty is not peculiar to Jews. It's a human one. Added to the difficulty that most of us are Americanized out of our skull and soul. Which is to say, translated, that after thirty years of cold war, we believe in violence. We put our stake on it; it's our very special skill. We incant it, we canonize it. 'Moving in troops' is our rough translation of moving history itself, by imposing American solutions on the world. As such, this is not a Jewish problem. It comes to focus in a tragic way on the Middle East right now, but it's really an American attitude which has infected all of us . . ."

The trouble, Father Berrigan added, is not only with respect to Zionists. "Catholics," he argued, "wouldn't notably differ from Zionists if, for example, we still had a hold on the old Papal States. There would be the same feeling, a kind of quasi-religious feeling about a certain turf. Catholics would say, 'Let's send in troops, save the Pope's acreage.'"

III

The Berrigan thesis, as it applies to Catholics, is at best debatable. So many Catholics are willing to forgo a Papal diplomatic corps that it is speculative how total would be the Catholic upset if it were a question today of the forgoing of the territory of the old Papal States. In any case, the analogy is not exact. Catholic identification is with the person of the pope, not acreage. The pope could be in Mobile, Alabama, for all the theological difference it would make to Catholicism as a religion or to Catholics as Catholics. The same is not true where Jews and Israel are concerned-which helps explain why a Zionist Congress in the early 1900s turned down a British offer to establish an autonomous Jewish settlement on a 6,000-mile tract of the East Africa Protectorate in what is now Uganda. For Jews there is a direct connection, theologically and as a people, with the Holy Places and the soil of the Prophets, so that Israel-the fruit of a successful Zionism-assumes a sacred as well as a national character.

That there is a Christian lack of grasp of this Jewish understanding is no figment of the imagination. Hence, in late October, the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith announced a nationwide educational program to combat the defaming of Zionism, and of Jews and Israel in the process. One of the objectives is education on the dual meaning of Zionism: what it stood for before the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948, and what it has stood for since. (The campaign will seek to make clear, for instance, that until 1948 Zionism's goal was the recreation of the Jewish homeland; since 1948, it has been the survival of the homeland and Israel's right to exist, thrive and prosper as a sovereign democratic state.) Ten days after the Anti-Defamation League's announcement, an official of the United States Catholic Conference, speaking in Memphis, urged Catholics to "get busy" in promoting better Catholic-Jewish relations, and he called for advancing Christian-Jewish dialogue from "social and civic issues" to

401 - Zionism and Christians

such knotty topics as Jewishness and Israel's meaning to Jews. The speaker was Monsignor George G. Higgins, Secretary for Research at the USCC. His especially cogent piece of advice: let the exploration be on "the plane of theology."

Monsignor Higgins pointed out that until lately Catholics and Jews have rarely, if ever, come together to talk about theological questions, but he predicted that this is likely to happen increasingly in the future because "there is a growing awareness on the part of both groups that, if each is to be fully itself, Judaism and Christianity must meet, in the spirit of mutual respect and reciprocal love, on the plane of theology." The purpose would not be to proselytize, for one to "convert" the other; it would rather be to plumb the theological depths of the common Catholic-Jewish spiritual heritage. In such a dialogue, Catholics would be more apt to come to an accurate understanding of Israel to Jewish consciousness, the monsignor suggested.

Monsignor Higgins conceded that Christian-Jewish dialogue had diminished since the 1967 Middle East crisis because of lack of Christian support for Israel. However, he said, this "silence" only strengthens the argument for increased dialogue. Monsignor Higgins commented that one of the reasons for lack of Christian support for Israel was that, generally speaking, Christians "did not then and do not now fully understand what Israel means to the Jews in theological terms. Jews themselves are the only ones who can help us overcome this gap in our knowledge." What this means, he added, is that the dialogue "must . . . include a profound study of the theological meaning of Israel from the Jewish point of view." Israel, in other words, must be placed at the top of the dialogue agenda.

Jesuit Father Avery Dulles is another who has suggested a Christian-Jewish dialogue on the matter of Israel and its meaning to Jews, although his approach seems somewhat less generously predisposed to general Jewish understanding on the topic than does Monsignor Higgins'. Or maybe it is that Dulles' suggestion is made to seem hard because of the specific questions that he says should be explored. In any case, in urging "more collaborative work" on the issue of "the Land, that is, the territory of Israel," Father Dulles declared: "There are sharp differences of opinion on this subject, not only between Jews and Christians but also within each group. In each community it is a hotly debated question whether the fulfillment of Israel's religious destiny depends upon possession of the Land." He said the question has both political and theological aspects, which "cannot be entirely separated from each other. It is a political question whether the Jews have a right to the territory of Israel comparable, for instance, to that of Americans to the territory of the United States. It is also a political question whether the possession of this sovereign state is helpful or necessary to the survival of the Jewish people."

402 - Zionism and Christians

The theological question, in Father Dulles' view, is "whether the Jews today have a claim on the Land of Israel by reason of the revealed will of God as expressed in the Bible. This is an exceedingly complex question, and one that cannot be solved by quoting one or two biblical texts. The solution calls for a profound exploration of covenant theology."

Father Dulles expressed doubt that a Christian-Jewish dialogue will "ever lead to full consensus." However, he said the dialogue was nonetheless necessary if the two groups are to arrive at what seems to him "the most urgent task of all-facing together the major issues arising from our common concern [of] jointly bearing witness to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob."

That a Dulles-like agenda would ever be acceptable to Jews generally is extremely doubtful. Many Jewish leaders might by happy to plan educational programs around the points raised by Father Dulles, but few would likely be anxious to dialogue on them as though a new set of conclusions might be reached. Such a dialogue, were it ever to occur, would quickly break down and probably end in recriminations. So I feel, in any instance, although I am willing to be proved wrong.

What I am saying, in sum, is that I do not see the Christian-Jewish thought gap on Israel closing easily or soon. I would add that the task of closing this gap is not helped by resolutions such as that adopted recently in Atlantic City by the Women's Division of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries, asking United States recognition of the Palestine Liberation Organization. The religious dialogue demands delicacy, not political abrasiveness, however sweetly worded.