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Is the New Testament Anti-Semitic?
By Jonas E. Alexis
“Even in times of social stress and upheaval the Constitution and Bill of Rights have served as a legal firewall to institutional anti-Semitism.”
David Turner, The Jerusalem Post
In the previous article, we have implicitly pointed out that anti-Semitism is foreign to the New Testament, for it exegetically and contextually deals with theology and the implications of that theology upon the lives of people, nations, and even the world. The New Testament does not and cannot espouse hatred of people of any creed or background, and the Apostle Paul himself declares in the midst of Mars’ hill that God “hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth…”
New Testament Greek
We have also pointed out that Christ was not being anti-Semitic for saying to one of His disciples at one time, “Get thee behind me, Satan…” (Matthew 16:23). These are serious languages, but the Savior of all mankind cannot hate the creatures He came to save! He even went out of His way to teach His followers to “love your enemies, bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven…” (Matthew 5:44-45).
Even to the last minute on the cross, Christ forgave those who had been accomplices in putting Him there: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Yes, Christ told them the truth and used “harsh” words, but He never espoused hatred toward them.
In general, Christ, His disciples, and Christianity in general cannot promote anti-Semitism or any form of hatred precisely because it is evil. But what about the harsh languages in the New Testament? Don’t they promote hatred?
We also did point out in the last section that when the woman of Canaan came to Jesus and asked Him to cast out an evil spirit out of her daughter, Jesus declared, “It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and cast it to dogs” (Matthew 15:26). Dogs? How could Christ use such a harsh language to convey a message? Couldn’t He substitute something else?
But again don’t get caught up by the word. We have to assume that Christ, who taught that one must love his/her neighbor, was not promoting hatred here, and the end of the story indicated what He was trying to teach His disciples. At the end, Jesus told the same woman, “O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt” (Matthew 15:28).
What about other passages which seem to indicate on the surface that the writers of the New Testament promoted hatred? The Apostle Peter, speaking to a Jewish crowd, declares, “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36).
What had happened over the centuries is that most Jewish scholars never got to read the entire context of story—sometimes they had chosen to do so deliberately. Once they saw the word “whom ye have crucified,” that was enough for them to say that the New Testament is anti-Semitic. They never finished the rest of the story where Peter declares that Christ came to bless them if they repented of their sins and accept Him as the Messiah (Acts 2:38-29).
Did God actually bless the Jews who accepted Christ? You tell me. Twelve disciples from a very dangerous place in the world at the time actually gave us Christianity, which has been a blessing for all mankind. I am in no way denying here that there have been abuses in the name of Christ throughout the centuries. That is another topic for another time.
Later on, the Apostle Paul, speaking to Christians, makes it clear that “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise” (Galatians 3:28-29). In other words, ethnicity ceases to have a major theological meaning. The “chosen people” now are those who have been accepted Christ, as Peter makes it clear once again to Christians: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).
To say that Jews are still God’s chosen people while at the same time denying Christ is a theological contradiction that Christ Himself addressed head-on. When the Pharisees kept telling Jesus that “We be Abraham’s seed,” Jesus responded by saying that “If ye were Abraham’s children, ye would do the works of Abraham,” which is another way of saying that they would have accepted Him as the Messiah. After a long dialogue, Jesus finally told them bluntly that “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do” (John 8).
Right here is perhaps where the whole theological discussion begins and ends. Jesus was making a theological point, and once again He was not promoting hatred. Nor was He saying that all ethnic Jews are the children of the devil, for Christ was an ethnic Jew and so were His disciples. As we argued in the last article, the word “Jew” has a theological meaning and it is this theological meaning that scholars throughout the centuries have failed to grasp.
Once Christ has been denied, something else has to be substituted. In other subsequent articles, whenever I refer to the term “Jew,” I am speaking primarily of the theological meaning and its historical, economic, political, and spiritual implications. I must reiterate that I have no quarrel with my fellow Jewish human beings, who have problems just like everyone else does. Christianity has a place for everyone: Jew, Muslim, atheist, Buddhist, you name it.
Moreover, one does not have to be a Christian in order to alienate himself from a wicked ideology which has wicked consequences. One does not have to be a Christian in order to say no to the Zionist and neoconservative dream, which has caused massive death in the Middle East and massive debt in the West, most particularly in America. Leaving the theological discussion aside, decent men of all the shades and variations must stand in opposition to wickedness, uphold that which is good, and deny that which is evil.
Sadly, the Zionist dream and the neoconservative ideology are part of that wickedness, and that decent people of all backgrounds, including our fellow Jewish men, must stand in opposition to them. Even now some Jewish rabbis are opposed to the Zionist madness, and we praise them for doing so. Christ taught, “Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God” (Matthew 5:9). As we shall see in a later article, the neoconservatives were not promoting peace in the Middle East when they went to war against Iraq with bold lies and deliberate fabrications.
The New Testament in particular is against wickedness and evil things wherever they are found, and this is why harsh languages are found throughout. Paul Himself has used harsh languages in order to correct and indoctrinate the church. But Paul was not an anti-Christian for doing so.
A Brief Historical Attack on the New Testament
Unfortunately, the New Testament has taken an unfortunate hit by Jewish writers, scholars, and Jewish organizations over the centuries because they see it as the seed of anti-Semitism. Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) declared in his book Never Again?: The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism:
“The anti-Jewish rhetoric that mars several books of the Christian New Testament has been shown to reflect not historical fact but the rivalry at the time the books were written between Jews who followed Jesus and those who did not.”[1]
Foxman moves on to assert unequivocally,
“For almost two thousand years Christian teachings drove the spread of anti-Semitism throughout Europe and beyond.”[2]
This is historically embarrassing. As I shall demonstrate in a later article, when Jews were physically being persecuted in some sections in Europe, it was the popes who stood out for them and declared that any physical persecution against Jews was anti-Catholic and therefore anti-Christian and must be stopped. Despite the mystification of history, Pope Pius XII never supported Hitler or even mobilized a number of people to save hundreds of Jews from being persecuted.
Foxman propounded one historical error after another and went on to declare that St. John Chrysostom in particular “ordered Christians to launch violent attacks against the Jews, which many soon did.”[3] The source? Foxman gave us none. And Foxman never gave us the historical context in which Chrysostom discussed his theological disputations.
In contrast, I would highly recommend Robert L. Wilken, Chrysostom and the Jews: Rhetoric and Reality in the 4th Century (Berkley: University of California Press, 1983), and Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996).[4]
Throughout history, of course, Chrysostom has been portrayed as an anti-Semite and has been viewed as one of the many early church fathers to implant the seed of anti-Semitism in Western culture. Yet Chrysostom was also known for denouncing the abuse of wealth among the clergy and the secular world and advocated caring for the poor and needy.
No one has ever come out and said that Chrysostom was an anti-clergy or anti-secular and blamed him for believing so. Yet all of a sudden he is to be labeled an anti-Semite because he preached against the synagogue! Moreover, why doesn’t Foxman tell us that Chrysostom was also against the abuse of wealth among the clergy? Because Foxman is writing under the unconvincing premise that Christianity, at its eventual root, is anti-Semitic.
Then Foxman cites James Carroll’s Constantine Sword as a reliable source in a different section of Never Again? Nothing could be further from the truth, and we will address Carroll’s book sometimes this summer. (Carroll himself even asserts that the New Testament is anti-Semitic.)
David Turner of the Jerusalem Post claims that anti-Semitism had its foundation in “the canon of universal Christianity,” most particularly in the epistles of Paul, which Turner declares “provide the inspiration for anti-Judaism.”[5]
David Turner
Turner declares in another article, “Hitler’s intention was to achieve a final solution to a Jewish Problem born two millennia before, with the first century Pauline and gospel texts.”[6]
Turner ended up proving indirectly that the church has been right all along, that the cosmic struggle between the two systems (Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism) is theological, not ethnic. Turner tells us that “the historical foundations for the West’s Jewish Problem” have their source in the “religious anti-Judaism in Christian scripture,” which gave grounds to the Holocaust. For Turner, there is a deep “Jew hatred” in those religious texts that gave rise to “secular anti-Semitism.”
Turner argues that there is a “historical tradition in Christianity” that always ends up “in serial persecutions” and expulsions of Jews throughout the Western world. He continues to claim that one of every two Jews born in the past thousand years has suffered intense persecution under Christianity.[7] Moreover, he states that the anti-Jewish attitude in the gospels of Matthew and John culminated in the “Final Solution.”[8]
Then Turner moves to the historically indefensible position that there is an ontological hatred of Jews throughout history which has absolutely nothing to do with Jewish participation in subversive activity.
First, Turner turns to America. He declares that the Leo Frank affair “illustrates the depth of antisemitism present in the United States for decades preceding the First World War, a level that only intensified after that war, and continued to do so through the Second World War and beyond.”[9]
What a pity for his case then that many of the judges involved in the trial were Jews—yet even they did not find Frank’s case convincing. For Turner, the spirit of anti-Semitism has been widespread over the last century throughout America, Austria, and other places.[10]
Turner also argues that
David Turner: The Bill of Rights and the Constitution are Anti-Semitic
“the Constitution and Bill of Rights have served as a legal firewall to institutional antisemitism.”[11]
This historically ridiculous statement would shock probably all Christian Zionists in America. Turner says that the 1920s showed that America had a deep anti-Semitic spirit which led to institutionalized anti-Semitism.[12] He accuses the Roosevelt Administration of anti-Semitism because it refused to allow immigrant Jews from Europe entrance.[13]
Not once did Turner mention the complex social issues of the 1920s, such as the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, which was largely viewed as a Jewish revolutionary activity.[14] During the Bolshevik Revolution, millions upon millions of people were killed, including innocent peasants.[15] And almost all serious people in Europe—including Winston Churchill—were scared to death of the consequences of that movement.
In addition, the Bolshevik ideology, with its Marxist leanings, began to spread like wildfire in Asian countries like China,[16] and wherever it went countries began killing their own people by the millions. Mao alone liquidated more than 40 million people.[17]
Not once did Turner mention that the U.S. State Department published a three-volume report in 1931 stating that Jewish-owned German banks conspired to send large sums of money to Lenin, Trotsky, and other Bolshevik luminaries to overthrow the Tsar.[18]
Jewish financiers such as Jacob Schiff in the United States and Max and Paul Warburg in Germany poured millions of dollars into the Bolshevik movement. Schiff is said to have given $20 million dollars to the regime—a sum equivalent to perhaps billions of dollars today.[19] Even The Jewish Encyclopedia calls communism and socialism Jewish phenomena.[20]
Jacob Schiff
Not once did Turner mention that the biggest gambler in America during the 1920s was none other than Arnold Rothstein, a man who esthetically terrorized politicians. Jewish Professor of History and Judaic Studies at the University of Oklahoma Michael Alexander declares that Rothstein “corrupted politicians. He ran four illegal casinos. He trained Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky in the ways of illicit finance and the organization of crime. And he was never convicted of a single crime, except in the newspapers…For the remainder of his career Rothstein’s name was synonymous with the victimless crime that battered the nation.”[21]
Alexander then goes on to write, “Any history of gambling and financial crime in the 1910s and 1920s must pay some attention to the history of the Jews in America. Jews pioneered the modern business of gambling and heavily participated in the closely related business of stock market bucketeering. Those are facts.”[22] Jewish writer Rich Cohen called Rothstein’s business “a blueprint for smuggling drugs in America.”[23]
Arnold rothstein
I contacted Turner and asked him to be more careful about sweeping assertions with little or no evidence. We had an interesting dialogue, and I will post the entire dialogue in the next article.
Turner is not the only person to view the New Testament as the bedrock upon which anti-Semitism is built. New Testament professor and orthodox Jew Amy-Jill Levine declares that her job is to eliminate what she perceives to be “anti-Jewish, sexist, and homophobic theologies”[24] in the New Testament. Levine is the author of The Misunderstood Jew.
In Levine’s view, as she declared in a talk given some years ago, the New Testament interpretation of anti-Semitism “continues to infect congregations and classrooms around the world.” She goes on to declare, “The problem is less the Christian right, who consider Jews the ‘chosen people’ and who have respect for what they call the ‘Old Testament.’ Rather, the problem is the Christian left: mainline churches; the World Council of Churches; liberation theologians; and usually well intended but naïve academics.”[25]
The late Hyam Maccoby, perhaps one of the most celebrated Jewish and Talmudic scholars of the last century, wrote in his work Antisemitism and Modernity that “It was in [the] Pauline Church, from which later Christianity derives, that anti-Semitism arose.”[26]
In other words, anything that Jewish organizations do not like can be called anti-Semitic. After Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion of the Christ was released, Charles Patterson blames all the horrors of Jewish suffering on the gospels’ accounts. “The trouble with Mel Gibson’s film ‘The Passion’ is not the film itself,” he writes, “but the gospel story on which it’s based. The gospel story, which has generated more anti-Semitism than the sum of all the other anti-Semitic writings ever written, created the climate in Christian Europe that led to the Holocaust. Long before the rise of Adolf Hitler, the gospel story about the life and death of Jesus had poisoned the bloodstream of European civilization.”[27]
Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ
Heinrich Graetz, arguably the first Jewish historiographer in the nineteenth century whose five-volume work has been essential in shaping my own thinking, drew the same conclusion, charging that Christians’ “hatred against Jews” is certainly “derived from the gospels and their theological literature.”[28] For Jami Bernard of the New York Daily News, Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ was “the most virulently antisemitic movie made since the German propaganda films of World War II.”[29]
Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, whose fraudulent book Hitler’s Willing Executioners we shall examine this spring, wrote that
Daniel Jonah Goldhagen
“Gibson’s film takes the fetishizing of horror and death that exists within Christianity to some sort of sickly logical conclusion. Visually, iconographically and symbolically, Gibson’s ‘Passion’ is a sadomasochistic, orgiastic display that demonizes Jews as it degrades those who revel in viewing the horror… Its orgy of unsurpassed and virtually unremitting sadism restores this part of the Jesus story — deemphasized by the Catholic Church since the Vatican II reforms — to center stage, to haunt all those who would follow Jesus with indelible, iconic images of cruelty. Gibson has thus unwittingly exposed the misguidedness of this cult of death.”[30]
This is the prevailing way of looking at the gospels or anything that portrays Jews as being an accomplice in the crucifixion, and Graetz in particular did not like Christianity at all, and he “was accused of a savage or even deathly hatred of Christianity.”[31] When Moses Hess sent him a letter describing how Hess hated Christianity and even called it “a religion of death” that would soon whither through the advent of Judaism,[32] Graetz responded by saying that Jewish intellectuals like himself and Hess must be delighted “in ‘scourging’ the Germans.”[33] Keep in mind that Graetz was writing before the rise of Nazi Germany.
As it turned out, it was largely this form of Jewish racism that Hitler and other secular nationalists in Nazi Germany began to disavow. And Germany never ran out of intellectual racialists and nationalists who would challenge that form of racial superiority. One of the most vigorous German intellectuals who stood up against that form of ideology was Heinrich von Treitschke. (We will meet him again in another article.)
Graetz added, “we must above all work to shatter Christianity.”[34] When Moses Mendelssohn’s daughter converted to Christianity, Graetz wrote that “It was a lamentable sight,” and when other women became weary with Judaism and ended up becoming Christian, Graetz wrote that those “women did Judaism a service by becoming Christians.”[35] When Andreas Eisenmenger made the mistake of becoming a Christian and wrote his influential work The Tradition of the Jews in 1700, Graetz said that “Eisenmenger belonged to the class of insects which sucks poison even out of flowers.”[36] Graetz continued to say that The Traditions of the Jews is “a venomous book” which has the potential to create the spirit of anti-Semitism.[37] Again, Joseph Pfefferkorn became a Christian in the sixteenth century, and Graetz called him “the scum of the Jewish people,” and a “noisome insect…”[38]
Heinrich Graetz
Graetz is not alone in this type of caricature. In the first century, Jewish historian Josephus became a fully assimilated Jew, yet Jewish historian Solomon Grayzel says that Josephus, among others things, “betrayed the cause of Jewish independence at the start.”[39] When Josephus later wrote that Titus did not want to destroy the Temple in A.D. 70, Grayzel declared that “Joseph always defented Titus before the Jews, and he was not above telling a falsehood when it suited his purpose.”[40]
In other words, the issue keeps coming back to theology and ideology and has little to do with ethnicity. If ethnicity were the issue, then Jews who become Christians would not be “insects” or “scums” of the earth. And isn’t it another form of racism to call people “noisome insect” simply because they move from Judaism to Christianity to a different religion?
Going back to Mel Gibson’s movie, Jewish professor Paul Fredriksen declares when the movie came out,
“When violence breaks out, Mel Gibson will have a much higher authority than professors and bishops to answer to.”[41]
The Los Angeles Times added that the movie is
“a gasoline-soaked rag tossed on the already roaring flames of anti-Semitism.”[42]
Rabbi Tovia Singer was more pessimistic. “By the time the first nail is hammered into the cross,” he said, “viewers in Germany will be passing around knife sharpeners in the theater. Israel may have to absorb a massive flight of European Jewry.”[43]
I honestly have no interest in Mel Gibson, but to frankly portray the movie as anti-Semitic is a contradiction which is inherent in the anti-Semitic tactic. For example, Fredricksen implies that the movie is anti-Semitc, but Fredriksen writes that it was the Jews who inspired Pilate to kill Jesus! After reading Fredricksen’s work, Jewish writer David Klinghoffer himself writes, “Pilate Killed Jesus. But even Fredriksen allows that it was the priests who tipped him off to the threat posed by the Christian savior—or rather, by those who followed him.”
The late Jewish novelist and television writer Howard Fast wrote in The Jews: Story of a People that “unless Christians finally come to understand the bitter and almost inadmissible truth, that the murder of six million Jews by the Germans was the final, hideous outcome of a Christian ideology that had spent two thousand years teaching mankind to hate the Jews—then the crucifixion of the Jews and the connected inhumanity of the Christian will continue, on and on, until finally mankind, in the name of that gentle Jew Jesus, who died without ever hearing the word Christian or knowing what agony his own people would suffer in his name, destroys itself.”[44]
Even dispensationalists like David K Lowery view the New Testament as anti-Semitic. Lowery goes so far as to say that there is “the strong denunciation of Israel that pervades the gospel” and there is again a “strong polemic against Israel.”[45] It is this type of thinking that pervades dispensational premillenialism as well. For example, futurist Dave Hunt has a whole chapter on anti-Semitism in his book Judgement Day!: Israel, Islam, and the Nations, and he even cites Abraham Foxman, of all people, to prove that anti-Semitism is on the rise.[46] Yet according to Hunt’s dispensational scheme, two-thirds of the Jews are going to be killed during the dispensational tribulation period![47] If Foxman reads this, he too would be accusing Hunt of being an anti-Semite.
Gibson even deleted scenes drawn from Matthew 27 before the movie came out. Sharon Waxman of the New York Times wrote that Gibson, “responding to focus groups as much as to protests by Jewish critics, has decided to delete a controversial scene about Jews from his film…A scene in the film, in which the Jewish high priest Caiaphas calls down a kind of curse on the Jewish people by declaring of the Crucifixion, ‘His blood be on us and on our children,’ will not be in the movie’s final version…”[48] Feldman and others of course do not lack the historical sophistication to see the converging evidence for the New Testament, but since they are the product of Rabbinic Judaism, they have to interpret the New Testament that way, even though the Talmud itself admits that Jesus was properly accused by rabbinical court.[49]
Anti-Semitism: The Challenge of the Old Testament
Let us take the issue even further. Judaism superficially claims the Old Testament as their motto. That provides a challenge for those who keep propounding that the New Testament is anti-Semitic. As Jewish convert to Christianity Micael L. Brown points out, if the New Testament and the gospels are anti-Semitic, then the Old Testament is anti-Semitic as well, for it has equally strong languages about Israel forsaking God and embracing paganism instead.[50] Consider for example what the prophet Isaiah said, “ye sons of the sorceress, the seed of the adulterer and the whore…are ye not children of transgression, a seed of falsehood, enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree, under the clifts of the rocks?” (Isiah 57:3-4; emphasis added).
Even at the beginning of the book of Isaiah, it was quite clear that the LORD wanted to go straight to the point: “Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corrupters: they have forsaken the LORD, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger, they are gone away backward” (Isaiah 1:4).
Hosea also declares that not only does Israel “commit falsehood,” but “They make the king glad with their wickedness, and the princes with their lies. They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, who ceaseth from raising after he hath kneaded the dough, until it be leavened” (Hosea 7:1, 2-4).
Moving on to the next chapters, we learn that “Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples” (Hosea 8:14ab); “Rejoice not, O Israel, for joy, as other people: for thou hast gone a whoring from thy God, thou hast loved a reward upon every cornfloor” (Hosea 9:1); “Ye have plowed wickedness, ye have reaped iniquity; ye have eaten the fruit of lies…” (Hosea 10:13); “O Israel, return unto the LORD thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity” (Hosea 14:1).
Similar languages with much vigor can be found throughout the Old Testament. The book of Micah declares that “the house of Jacob, and the princes of the house of Israel” not only “abhor judgment, and pervert all equity,” but “They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity” (Micah 3:9-10).
Moreover, “The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money…” (Micha 3:11). Here again is what the Old Testament says,
And the LORD God of their fathers sent to them by his messengers, rising up betimes, and sending; because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place: But they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and misused his prophets, until the wrath of the LORD arose against his people, till there was no remedy. Therefore he brought upon them the king of the Chaldees, who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion upon young man or maiden, old man, or him that stooped for age: he gave them all into his hand. And all the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king, and of his princes; all [these] he brought to Babylon. And they burnt the house of God, and brake down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces thereof with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels thereof. And them that had escaped from the sword carried he away to Babylon; where they were servants to him and his sons until the reign of the kingdom of Persia (2 Chronicles 36:15-20).
Did God hate the people of Israel for saying these things? Was He an anti-Semite? The answer is no. And not a single rabbi or Jewish writer, as far as I know, has written a book saying that the God of the Old Testament was anti-Semitic for taking such actions upon the people of Israel. Yet all of a sudden the New Testament is anti-Semitic for borrowing almost the language of the Old Testament! Something does not add up here.
Even during the time of Moses, the LORD declared then, “Say unto the children of Israel, Ye are a stiffnecked people: I will come up into the midst of thee in a moment, and consume thee: therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee, that I may know what to do unto thee” (Exodus 33:5). Similar utterances are recorded Deuteronomy 31:27-29, Isaiah 30:8-9, Ezekiel 2:3-4, etc.[51]
Brown argues quite rightly, “Why then are verses such as these are not considered to be primary theological sources of anti-Semitism? Why is it only the New Testament verses—none of which make such wide-ranging charges—that are supposedly anti-Semitic? Why not argue that God himself, along with the prophets he inspired, was anti-Semitic?”[52]
Rabbis and Jewish writers who label the New Testament anti-Semitic cannot have it both ways: they cannot accuse the New Testament of anti-Semitism when in fact the New Testament is not as harsh as the Old Testament in language.
Throughout his work Antisemitism and Modernity and many others, Maccoby is very hostile to the gospels, and Paul’s writings in particular, and on many occasions calling them a “myth.”[53] Maccoby goes so far as to say that “Paul transformed Gnostic anti-Semitism by introducing the idea of the divine death—an idea which, it seems probable, he absorbed from Hellenistic mystery-cults such as that of Attis…Paul’s claim of Jewish birth and Pharisee upbringing is dubious. He was probably of Gentile birth, became converted to Judaism, and then developed an amalgam of Gnosticism and mystery-religion, using Jewish materials in the Gnostic style of radical re-interpretation. In the gospels and Acts…Paul’s vague outline of an anti-Semitic myth was given narrative elaboration. The Jews were portrayed as hostile to the higher truths brought to them by Jesus, as seeking his death, handing him over to the Romans on a false charge of sedition, and persuading and blackmailing a reluctant Roman governor into executing him.”[54]
To re-emphasize, the gospels, by definition, cannot be anti-Semitic, for the gospels cannot hate people. Moreover, Paul continually makes references to the Jews as people whom God had used to transmit His message to the world. In the first chapter of the book of Romans, he clearly says, “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16).
In addition, how can Paul be anti-Semitic when he was willing to be accursed from Christ for the Jews? Paul declares, “That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh; Who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever” (Romans 9:2-5).
Here and elsewhere Paul praised the Jews as God’s instruments. Previously he writes, “What advantage then hath the Jew? Or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God” (Romans 3:12).
Far be it from the New Testament to even remotely make anti-Semitic remarks. Paul again declares, “What then? Are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin” (Romans 3:9). But many Jews did not understand that Christ is the fulfillment of all the laws. Christ’s dying on the cross is the end of sacrificial ritual as practiced in the Old Testament, for they “are a shadow of things to come; but the body [is] of Christ” (Colossians 2:17).
If Jewish scholars want to address the issue in ethnic term, let me drop a particular note here that will clear some confusion here: Both the Old and the New Testaments are ethnically Jewish, “for salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22).
In order to clear up confusion, it is pertinent to reiterate that when Christ was categorically and metaphysically denied at the foot of the cross, the “synagogue of Satan” took over, and over the years the wicked ideology of the synagogue was codified in a particular theological text: the Talmud. Ever since, Jewish life has never been the same, since theology shapes the foundation of those who hold it.
From now on, when I used the word “Jewish,” I am not necessarily talking about ethnicity. As a general rule, I am referring to the historical, political, and economic and spiritual implications of the “synagogue.” This “synagogue” has been the theological backdrop of all significant revolutions in the West, from the fifteenth century and all the way to the twenty-first century. This includes the French Revolution, the Turkish Revolution, rapacious usury in our modern age, etc. We will discuss these issues in much detail this summer.
[1] Abraham Foxman, Never Again?: The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism (New York: HarperCollins, 2003), 47.
[2] Ibid., 48.
[3] Ibid.
[4] I have addressed this issue more fully in Christianity & Rabbinic Judaism (Volume II).
[5] David Turner, “From Anti-Judaism to Anti-Semitism: The Age of Reason,” Jerusalem Post, October 6, 2011.
[6] David Turner, “The Final Solution: Extermination as First and Last Resort, Part 2,” Jerusalem Post, February 24, 2012.
[7] David Turner, “Sources of Christian Doubt: The Quest for the Historical Jesus,” Jerusalem Post, September 8, 2011.
[8] David Turner, “Holocaust Remembrance as Holocaust Denial,” Jerusalem Post, January 30, 2012.
[9] David Turner, “An American Lynching: The Leo Max Frank Affair,” Jerusalem Post, December 28, 2011.
[10] David Turner, “Political AntiSemitism in the United States: 1873-1932,” Jerusalem Post, December 15, 2011.
[11] David Turner, “The United States and the Holocaust, 1: Background to Passivity,” Jerusalem Post, March 7, 2012
[12] David Turner, “Anti-Semitism as National Policy: The U.S. Congress Shuts the Borders, 1923-4,” Jerusalem Post, January 25, 2012.
[13] David Turner, “The Acquiescence of the United States in the Murder of the Jews,” Jerusalem Post, April 12, 2012.)
[14] See Slezkine, The Jewish Century; Carr Hallett Edward, The Bolshevik Revolution (New York; Macmillan, 1950); Stephen F. Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980); Adam B Ulam, Bolsheviks (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980); Jerry Z. Muller, Capitalism and the Jews (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010). Many scholars do not declare that Jews were at the forefront of the revolution because this would imply that anti-Jewish reactions would have to be reassessed.
[15] See Robert Conquest, Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivism and the Terror-Famine (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008) and The Great Terror (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990); Miron Dolot, Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust (New York: W. W. Norton, 1987).
[16] See Steven Rosefielde, Red Holocaust (New York: Routledge, 2010).
[17] See Frank Dikotter, Mao’s Great Famine (New York: Walker, 2010).
[18] http://avalon.law.yale.edu/subject_menus/forrel.asp.
[19] See Gary Allen, None Dare Call It Conspiracy (Cutchogue, NY: Buccaneer Books, 1976).
[20] Cyrus Adler and Isidore Singer, ed., The Jewish Encyclopedia (New York: Funk-Wagnalls, 1901-1906), 583-585.
[21] Michael Alexander, Jazz Age Jews (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001), 15.
[22] Ibid., 16; emphasis added.
[23] Rich Cohen, Tough Jews: Fathers, Sons, and Gangster Dreams (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1999), 132.
[25] “Preaching and Teaching the New Testament: Promoting Anti-Judaism?” www.adl.org, November 1, 2007.
[26] Hyam Maccoby, Antisemitism and Modernity: Innovation and Continuity (New York: Routledge, 2006), 13.
[27] Quoted in Gentry, Navigating the Bookf of Revelation, 183.
[28] Graetz, History of the Jews, Vol. V (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society,1895), 44.
[29] Quoted in Ben Child, “Jim Caviezel Claims the Passion of the Christ Made Him a Hollywood Outcast,” Guardian, May 3, 2011.
[30] Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, “Mel Gibson’s Cross of Vengeance,” The Jewish Daily Forward, March 5, 2004; emphasis added.
[31] Cited in Elliott Horowitz, Reckless Rites: Purim and the Legacy of Jewish Violence (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006), 262.
[32] Albert S. Lindemann, Esau’s Tears: Modern Anti-Semitism and the Rise of the Jews (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 91.
[33] Ibid.
[34] Ibid., 141; emphasis added.
[35] Graetz, History of the Jews, Vol. V, 424, 425.
[36] Heinrich Graetz, History of the Jews, volume V (Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1895), 187.
[37] Ibid., 187-188.
[38] Graetz, History of the Jews, volume IV, 423.
[39] Solomon Grayzel, A History of the Jews: From the Babylonian Exile to the Establishment of Israel (Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1947), 165.
[40] Ibid., 171.
[41] Quoted in David Klinghoffer, Why the Jews Rejected Jesus: The Turning Point in Western History (New York: Doubleday, 2005), 2.
[42] Ibid.
[43] Ibid.
[44] Howard Fast, The Jews: Story of a People (New York: The Dial Press, Inc., 1968), 325.
[45] Gentry, Navigating the Book of Revelation, 183.
[46] Hunt, Judgment Day!, chapter 2.
[47] Ibid., 361-362.
[48] Quoted in Gentry, Navitaging the Book of Revelatioin, 184.
[49] For a historical survey, see Christianity & Rabbinic Judaism (volume I).
[50] See Michael Brown, Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, volume I, 145-175.
[51] Brown discusses those passages in much detail.
[52] Ibid., 148.
[53] Mccoby, Antisemitism and Modernity, 14.
[54] Ibid.
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Posted by Jonas E. Alexis on Feb 14 2013, With 0 Reads, Filed under Editor, History. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
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“Jews pioneered the modern business of gambling and heavily participated in the closely related business of stock market bucketeering.”
While reading the article a second time I wonder if it is possible that lots of their legal businesses are just results of some sort of money laundering.
Yes. I will address the issue more fully when I get to rapacious usury.
The FIRST premise of all law is that the creator of something has property rights over that which he created and can do with it what he pleases.
“bring hither those enemies of mine, that would not have me reign over them, and slay them before me.” (Luke 19:27)
As Creator/Savior the Lord exerts this prime right and exterminates the enemies of his with absolute righteous authority to do so and what a GRAND day that will be.
Yes Tyron, and people accuse me of hateful remarks. But of course, you are a true Xtian, who knows that your most beloved sky phantasm will certainly exterminate the vast majority of humanity simply because they do not believe in your sky phantasm. “I came to send fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled.” (Luke 12:49) “Do you suppose I came to bring peace on earth? I tell you , not at all” (v. 51) You gotta love it. You gotta, or you will be exterminated. Too bad Tyron’s Bible god isn’t tough enough to handle a little criticism. But that is what you would expect with a Jealous god whose name is Jealous. (Ex. 34:14) He is a typical conservative weakling. A wuss.
Bless you Tyron,
Infidel
What a grand day that will be
In my opinion there never was a Jesus as we are sold by the Bible. Jesus was at that time a rather common hebrew name and there were always a few “prophets” trying to make a living without working.
There is not a single, undeniable proof of his being.
Tomer,
What is deemed as “proof” is much like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder. What exactly constitutes “proof”? See, this exact issue is what separates true Israel/Judah and other believers from those who very well may parish.
I listed below 3 eye witnesses as recorded at the time period. Offical Government records.Check it out. Here are just some of the non Christian sources who confirm Jesus’ existance.
Flavius Josephus
According to his Wikipedia entry: “Titus Flavius Josephus (37 – c. 100), was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in 70.”
Tacitus
Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Historian who lived from 55-120AD. In 115 AD, P. Cornelius Tacitus wrote the following passage that refers to Jesus (called “Christus,” which means “The Messiah”) in book 15, chapter 44 of The Annals after a six-day fire burned much of Rome:
Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus, (61 AD – ca. 112 AD) : “better known as Pliny the Younger, was a lawyer, author, and magistrate of Ancient Rome. According to Wikipedia: “Pliny is known for his hundreds of surviving letters, which are an invaluable historical source for the time period. Many are addressed to reigning emperors or to notables such as the historian, Tacitus. Pliny himself was a notable figure, serving as an imperial magistrate under Trajan (reigned AD 98–117). Pliny was considered an honest and moderate man, consistent in his pursuit of suspected Christian members according to Roman law, and rose through a series of Imperial civil and military offices, the cursus honorum.”
Julius Africanus and Tallus
Sextus Julius Africanus (c.160 – c.240) was a Christian traveller and historian of the late 2nd and early 3rd century AD. He is important chiefly because of his influence on Eusebius, on all the later writers of Church history among the Fathers, and on the whole Greek school of chroniclers
Julius Africanus quotes the writings of Tallus, who was a first century non-Christian historian. In his Chronicles, Africanus quoting the historian Tallus, explains the reason for it being so dark during the day time on the day of crucifixion of Jesus Christ:
Lucian of Samosate
Lucian (Born 115 AD) was a well-known Greek satirist and traveling lecturer. More than eighty works bear his name. He mocked Christians in his writing, but at the same time provided evidence that Jesus really did exist:
Seutonius
Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus commonly known as Suetonius (ca. 69/75 – after 130), was a Roman historian belonging to the equestrian order in the early Imperial era. His most important surviving work is a set of biographies of twelve successive Roman rulers, from Julius Caesar to Domitian, entitled De Vita Caesarum. The description of his writings states:
To read more on this here is a link http://beginningandend.com/jesus-exist-historical-evidence-jesus-christ/
Tomer,
What is deemed as “proof” is much like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder. What exactly constitutes “proof”? See, this exact issue is what separates true Israel/Judah and other believers from those who very well may parish.
I listed below 3 eye witnesses as recorded at the time period. Offical Government records.Check it out. Here are just some of the non Christian sources who confirm Jesus’ existance.
Flavius Josephus
According to his Wikipedia entry: “Titus Flavius Josephus (37 – c. 100), was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in 70.”
Tacitus
Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Historian who lived from 55-120AD. In 115 AD, P. Cornelius Tacitus wrote the following passage that refers to Jesus (called “Christus,” which means “The Messiah”) in book 15, chapter 44 of The Annals after a six-day fire burned much of Rome:
Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus, (61 AD – ca. 112 AD) : “better known as Pliny the Younger, was a lawyer, author, and magistrate of Ancient Rome. According to Wikipedia: “Pliny is known for his hundreds of surviving letters, which are an invaluable historical source for the time period. Many are addressed to reigning emperors or to notables such as the historian, Tacitus. Pliny himself was a notable figure, serving as an imperial magistrate under Trajan (reigned AD 98–117). Pliny was considered an honest and moderate man, consistent in his pursuit of suspected Christian members according to Roman law, and rose through a series of Imperial civil and military offices, the cursus honorum.”
Julius Africanus and Tallus
Sextus Julius Africanus (c.160 – c.240) was a Christian traveller and historian of the late 2nd and early 3rd century AD. He is important chiefly because of his influence on Eusebius, on all the later writers of Church history among the Fathers, and on the whole Greek school of chroniclers
Julius Africanus quotes the writings of Tallus, who was a first century non-Christian historian. In his Chronicles, Africanus quoting the historian Tallus, explains the reason for it being so dark during the day time on the day of crucifixion of Jesus Christ:
Lucian of Samosate
Lucian (Born 115 AD) was a well-known Greek satirist and traveling lecturer. More than eighty works bear his name. He mocked Christians in his writing, but at the same time provided evidence that Jesus really did exist:
Seutonius
Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus commonly known as Suetonius (ca. 69/75 – after 130), was a Roman historian belonging to the equestrian order in the early Imperial era. His most important surviving work is a set of biographies of twelve successive Roman rulers, from Julius Caesar to Domitian, entitled De Vita Caesarum.
Jonas,
you dont have to publish the one that is on moderation with the link attached. If Tomer what to see their writings in full, he can simply do a simple search.
Tomer, I agree with you. My current position is that there never was a historical Jesus, never mind the magic man, Jesus. All the bull shit from Tyron below has been refuted by many scholars. Notice that not one of the “witnesses” from Tyron is a contemporary of the alleged Jesus. Check the dates. There were many writers during the supposed lifetime of Jesus, including Philo of Alexandria, but no one noticed that the miracle man was around the hood. Xtians have no proof of the existence of Jesus and so they must always rely on faith, supported by bull shit. So sad.
Amen,
Infidel
Thank you for the article, sir.
Thanks. Subsequent articles will be quite edgy.
Jonas, not one or those people were “eye witnesses” of Jesus. Josephus was not a contemporary of Jesus. This is standard Xtian apologetics that works on sheep. There is not one contemporary writer who even knew Jesus existed. All those miracles and no one noticed.
Amen,
Infidel
Wolf, to answer your question, what happens after you die, I have no reason to believe that anything happens except mindless decay. When you step on an ant, do visions of eternity dance in your head like sugar plumbs on Xmas eve? Why would it be different for a human? I do not buy all the inferences of so called near death experiences. They are “all natural” experiences.I do not believe in souls, but I love soul music.
Happy trails to you,
Infidel
No wonder you put so much energy into trying prove your religion.
Many thanks for the article, Sir.
Jewish Fanaticism, is best examplified by a systematic eagerness to make non -jews feel guilty, to make them hang their heads and fall to their knees for crimes they did not commit, or for crimes for which Jews themselves might feel a little guilty but prefer “to transfer” to others.
A former Israeli cabinet minister Shulamit Aloni (born 1928), during her August 14, 2002 interview with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! said it all:
“Well, it’s a trick, we always use it. When from Europe somebody is criticizing Israel then we bring up the holocaust. When in this country (US) people are criticizing Israel then they are antisemitic. And the organization (Israel Lobby) is very strong and has lot of money. And the ties between Israel and American Jewish establishment are very strong – and they are strong in this country as you know.”
They publically burn the NT in “Israel” for that very reason.
Jonas, your long winded article is stercus tauri. Jesus tells us to love our enemies but he sends his enemies to hell, where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth, and for all eternity, where the fires are never quenched and the worm never dies. You don’t even have to be his enemy. All you have to do is doubt his bull shit and you are “condemned already.” (John 3:18) The New T is not only ant-Jewish, it is anti-human.
I love the way the god expert, Pat Robertson, once put it, “The lord tells me to love my enemies, but I don’t have to be nice to them.” Hallelujah!
Agape,
Infidel
Thanks for the comment. Jesus “sends his enemies to hell…” That is an extraordinary claim, and I would like you to provide evidence for this. Then we can talk about the passages that you indicated here. I also did mention very clearly in the article that I am not denying the fact that there have been abuses in the name of Christ, and if you mention Pat Robertson as an indication Christianity is bad, then shame on him. If five or ten or fifteen police officers begin to commit violent crimes, should we close down all the police department because all it is all corrupt? And how did Robertson become a “God expert”? What about millions upon millions of devoted Christians through the centuries who have given up their lives for the cause of treating their enemies with kindness and real love?
Before you can dismiss the New Testament as “anti-human,” you have to be able to answer the big questions: how did the universe get here? Are you just an accident? What does this life actually mean? What is my relationship to reality? Then we can talk about minor things such as the Bible.
No, Gary doesn’t have to be able to answer these big questions Jonas, you do ! From the FB comments section of your previous article ‘Nietszche Goes to Hollywood’ you comment:
“There is no such thing as “the proof of God.” But we are rational people and we make logical deduction and inference”
You are not alone in this of course, but at least you admit it and without being able to answer this big question, the Bible could certainly be classed, in you own words, as a minor thing…..except to say this; there are 2.3 billion Christian adherents in the world so it has certainly had a big influence and you quote from this text frequently. However, Christianity has not (as you state) been a blessing for all mankind but possibly a comfort to some who choose to ‘believe’.
Thanks for the comment. This is going to be just one response, since in my view you tend to dismiss a number of points which I have brought up earlier with little evidence. Yes, I did say that there is no “proof of God,” and by proof here I mean if you are looking for something like mathematics. If you are going to discount the notion of God by the restrictive way of thinking you have provided, then you are in big trouble with a wide range of historical evidence (see for example Christopher Behan McCullagh’s Justifying Historical Description, Cambridge University Press), archaeological evidence (Michael R. Licona’s The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach, InterVarsity Press), philosophical evidence (Richard Swinburne’s The Existence of God, Oxford University Press), scientific evidence (Karl Popper’s The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Routlege), etc. You should know very well that science works under the premise that the universe is “rational,” but there is no scientific evidence for this.
Yes, all worldviews—religious or secular—have to give answers to the big questions. By big questions I mean the questions of origin, morality, meaning, and destiny.
If Christianity has not been a blessing to all mankind, I would highly recommend a historical search for the “religious,” scientific and philosophical origin of the West in particular, and how that blessing spread through virtually all the areas of Western culture, and how Western culture in turn impacted just about every other culture in one way or another. I am in no way denying that other cultures such as Islam have not made great contributions to the West. Islam in particular was a great intellectual force during the Middle Ages and beyond.
See for example the following books: The Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosophical, Religious, and Institutional Context, Prehistory to A.D. 1450 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007); Ronald L. Numbers, ed., Galileo Goes to Jail and Other Myths about Science and Religion (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010); Gary Ferngren, ed., Science and Religion: A Historical Introduction (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002); John Hedley Brooke, Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspective (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998); David C. Lindberg and Ronald L. Numbers, God and Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounters between Christianity and Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986); When Science and Christianity Meet (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2003). Edward Grant, Science and Religion, 400 B.C. to A.D. 1550: From Aristotle to Copernicus (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004); Rodney Stark, For the Glory of God: How Monotheism led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004); One True God: Historical Consequences of Monotheism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001); William T. Cavanaugh, The Myth of Religious Violence: Secular Ideology and the Roots of Modern Conflict (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009);
Thanks again.
“Science works under the principle that the universe is rational?” That’s news to me.
We do not have to answer the “big questions” but I will anyway. Where did we come from (origins)? I don’t know, yet. Theologians don’t know either, they just make shit up.Morality comes from human experience. No gods required. Meaning? I will determine my own meaning, if I choose. Destiny? A product of indigestion. How am I doing so far?
Your list of books by Xtian apologists is very impressive, but there are other books.
Happy trails to you,
Infidel
Amazing again ! I am NOT discounting the notion of God at all on any level…..I am agnostic about that as you are well aware and apparently respect. Neither am I a restricted thinker on the subject Jonas – a little subtle ad hominem from you there, with respect.
Both of us are on a losing wicket here actually as there are rational people on this planet who come to different conclusions. I could ask you questions for hours and you will have ‘answers’ and literary quotations in support of every one of those answers Why ? Because you ‘believe’ and and will continue to ‘believe’ and have every right to do so. However, 2.3 billion people of Christian denomination (and not all practising by any stretch of the imagination) means that potentially around 3.7 billion people may not be in your corner on the ‘all mankind’ front.
Thanks for the recommended preaching – sorry, reading – list by the way, but I have to get through my own list first.
“Let us call this unknown something: God. It is nothing more than a name we assign to it. The idea of demonstrating that this unknown something (God) exists, could scarcely suggest itself to Reason. For if God does not exist it would of course be impossible to prove it; and if he does exist it would be folly to attempt it. For at the very outset, in beginning my proof, I would have presupposed it, not as doubtful but as certain (a presupposition is never doubtful, for the very reason that it is a presupposition), since otherwise I would not begin, readily understanding that the whole would be impossible if he did not exist. But if when I speak of proving God’s existence I mean that I propose to prove that the Unknown, which exists, is God, then I express myself unfortunately. For in that case I do not prove anything, least of all an existence, but merely develop the content of a conception”. (Soren Kierkegaard)
Gary Walker,
“‘Science works under the principle that the universe is rational?’ That’s news to me.” It’s always a good idea to keep up with the scientific research that has been developed over the last fifty years, and I have cited some of the books in an earlier response to another individual. Check them out, and the vast majority of them are written by non-Christians. That’s all I am going to say now.
I am interested in the assertion that “Morality comes from human experience.” In other words, my experience is quite different than yours, but instead of even appreciating my experience, you said that some theologians “make [the] shit up.” I thought we are living in a world of diversity? I thought freethinkers like you appreciate the opinions of others? I will never use such a language to describe your worldview because I respect you as a decent human being. Why can’t you return the favor? It’s not a diverse world after all.
Once again you declare, “Meaning? I will determine my own meaning, if I choose.” You know, Nietzsche would agree with you 100% on that point, and I would too. Now, how does your meaning differ from that of Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Mother Theresa, etc.? They too have their own meaning and it is presumptuous of you to say that they are wrong.
And then in a pathetic parody, you declare, “Destiny? A product of indigestion.” Thanks for taking things so seriously.
“Your list of books by Xtian apologists is very impressive, but there are other books.” Once again, the books cited are largely written by non-Christians. Thanks.
Jonas,
I understand why you are responding to Walker above but let me warn you in Christ- IGNORE him. He is a anti Christ par excellence who’s M.O. is to spread doubt among believers by way of making rediculous arguments with willful disregard to all reason, truth, logic or science.
Well hello Tyron, ol buddy. I hope you had a nice Darwin Day, Tuesday Feb. 12.
Agape,
Infidel
If anyone does not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed. Maranatha! (1Cor. 16:22)
These were the words of Paul, the creator of Xtianity. Paul was an intolerant jerk, a Pharisee, tribe of Benjamin, the Bible tells us so.
The earliest gospel, Mark, claims, “He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.”(Mark 16:16)
These verses, along with many others, are anti-human. To answer your question, my relationship with reality does not include blind faith in superstitious nonsense as expressed pathetically in the story of Doubting Thomas. “Blessed are those who believe and have not seen.” This is why you must become as a child, right?
Where did I come from? If I heard this once, I have heard it 666 times. I came from planet Kolob, and I am here to save you, not to condemn you.
Amen,
Infidel
Everyone,
Just ignore Gary Walker- Anti Christ. There is no reasoning with him. There is no truth in him. There is no reason using logic with him. There is no reason to using science with him. There is no reason toward using established histories, admissions or any type of evidence known to man concerning his lies. Simply, there is no reason to even speak with him. He has condemed himself more times than I can count….a so called human (actually anti human) sitting around awaiting his day of utter oblivion.
Everyone,
As Alex Kurtagis said recently pertaining leftists, in paticular, pro illegal immigrants but his description also applies to leftist athiests alike:
(believers in Christ often believe) “that if presented with hard facts and water-tight arguments, any reasonable person will pause, reflect, and modify his views accordingly.
This may happen in some cases, but only when the matter under discussion is in accord with the dominant morality, which in this case is liberal morality.
When it is in contradiction to the dominant morality, evidence and reason are no longer used to ascertain the truth or find a practical solution. Rather, it is twisted to prove that the dominant morality is correct and anything that challenges it is wrong, evil, and beyond discussion.
This is why we so often see otherwise highly intelligent individuals undergo all manner of intellectual and rhetorical contortions (Hart,Walker, BJ Bronco,and Gordon Duff when it comes to certain subjects and some others on this site), not to mention emotional and psychological agitation, when their beliefs are challenged by evidence…..
This is why no matter what arguments and evidence are thrown in the direction of supporters of (Liberalism-atheist/human secularism derived from Talmudism as an outward expression), they will always come back with counter-arguments and counter-evidence. The aim is not to find the truth, but to avoid being convinced.
These beliefs are prior to, not the result of, empirical evidence processed by reason. Empirical evidence is subordinate to these beliefs because all evidence is always evaluated in relation to prior beliefs”
Just so you know…..
Interesting…and that position can equally be applied to theists as atheists can it not Tyron ? For the theist to believe, he surely requires the ‘leap of faith’ (or ‘leap by faith’ as Kierkegaard would have put it in his writings). For example, I doubt it would matter what I put up on this board, as Jonas (whose writing I generally like by the way) will always come back with a huge array of evidence / quotes / recommended books to support his position and it may be suggested that”……These beliefs are prior to, not the result of, empirical evidence processed by reason. Empirical evidence is subordinate to these beliefs because all evidence is always evaluated in relation to prior beliefs”
Or as James Randi put it in relation to belief in general, not just religious belief (although he is himself an atheist):
“There exists in society a very special class of persons that I have always referred to as the Believers. These are folks who have chosen to accept a certain religion, philosophy, theory, idea or notion and cling to that belief regardless of any evidence that might, for anyone else, bring it into doubt. They are the ones who encourage and support the fanatics and the frauds of any given age. No amount of evidence, no matter how strong, will bring them any enlightenment. They are the sheep who beg to be fleeced and butchered, and who will battle fiercely to preserve their right to be victimized… the U.S. Patent Office handles an endless succession of inventors who still produce perpetual-motion machines that don’t work, but no number of idle flywheels will convince these zealots of their folly; dozens of these patent applications flow in every year. In ashrams all over the world, hopping devotees of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi will never abandon their goal of blissful levitation of their bodies by mind power, despite bruises and sprains aplenty suffered as they bounce about on gym mats like demented (though smiling) frogs, trying to get airborne. Absolutely nothing will discourage them”.
OrdinarySerf
You asked
“and that position can equally be applied to theists as atheists can it not Tyron ?”
Answer
Yes, sometimes, but not to those called by the true Christ in relation to others on this planet.
You said
“For the theist to believe, he surely requires the ‘leap of faith’”
Answer
All belief systems require faith (belief in the unseen or realized yet) but none so as much as the atheist human secularist who believes against all evidence that everything came about by random accident and that life came from a soup of rocks and water.
Many thanks Tyron…..and that’s why I wouldn’t class myself as an atheist human secularist !
It is acknowledged that this is a complex subject to say the least and I was particularly interested in your ‘Judaizing of Christianity’ post I picked up here last night……superb.
I should perhaps point out (as the Randi quote is quite forceful in places) that I am not aiming it specifically at Jonas ! I think Randi was more referring to the ‘blind belief’ of people who walk into an auditorium with televangelist types like Peter Popoff, whom Randi exposed on the Carson show in the 1980s.
What is interesting about Mr. Walkers’ posts is the lack of context, and the hateful glee with which he distorts any attempt to bring a true examination of Christianity. Walker is a lot like that kid in grade school who would run around dipping girl’s pony tails in ink, and popping balloons next to his classmate’s ears. Now he’s grown up, and this is what we get.
Ultimately, any discussion of a true, living spirituality-be it Christian, or any other tradition is going to include the essence, or it is not. The over analysis, and forced categorization of the spiritual imperative causes the spirit to be lost in swirl of endless rhetoric.
You either have experienced the fire of God, of the Soul, or you have not. If you have not, no words can bring you to this place. If you have, no words can accurately convey this experience. One potential exception exists, and that is great poetry, and great art.
Christianity is NOT exclusive, hateful, or delighting in the torture of others. I direct the mindless vitriol throwers to the Celtic Church for proof of what Christianity really is, and really can be.
O. Serf, it is not anyone else’s job to justify and provide you, or anyone else with a solid, ironclad explanation of any twisted argument that comes to light. If you want to approach God, approach Spirit, then you will embark on your path. Sitting in the bushes and sniping away at those who seek to clarify important aspects of theology is not going to illuminate that path for you, or anyone else.
Dear Readers, the spiritual path does not often grab us by the hackles and shake us awake. It is rather more like a burden, or an unquenchable thirst.
The constant ridicule doled out here is not based on any need to know, it is based on a primitive intent to deliver that “gotcha” moment.
Mike, sniping at people who ask legitimate questions in the sincere attempt to further understand an important subject is not compatible with a Christian approach in my opinion.
People who believe they have ‘seen the light’ (sometimes) tend to have a rather condescending attitude, encompassing a degree of incredulity at the perceived dimness of those ‘poor souls’ who haven’t.
There are (at least) two sides to any debate and if you are expecting people to simply accept everything that is written here as ‘gospel’ then, (particularly on a site like VT), I think you are going to be out of luck on that, but thanks for your reply and I respect you sharing your own personal experience on this topic.
Those who experienced the numinous are not condescending in their inability to convey this moment in words. How exactly can one explain the totality of the experience with a method of communication linked to one narrow cross section of consciousness?
The striving to out compete other humans is not the realm of the Spirit, or of God.
If one is curious, and has the burden to understand, to know, then the seeker must begin their own journey. This is not a spectator sport. There is no vicarious ride.
I’ve experienced the numinous Mike. Otto described it as “Mysterium Tremendum” with three main elements:
*Tremendum
*Mysterium
*Fascinans
In my view, there isn’t a person on the planet who hasn’t experienced it at various times; it’s a normal part of brain functioning. Some people then go on to take that leap of faith and attribute it to some kind of divine intervention, thinking they have discovered something that others haven’t and I suppose one could say, in religious terms that is their God given right.
Bless you Tyron. I had faith that you would ignore me. I love it when you ignore me. White people rock.
Amen,
Infidel
Gary is stiff necked.
Mr. Alexis,
I am afraid that your attempt to educate people may fall on deaf ears. The concept/idea/ belief pattern that is ethnicity is so strong in so many people that understanding the finer and more subtle theological perspective is easily left behind and forsaken.
Indeed, even in the scriptures, the use of terms and phrases such as Abrahams’ seed lend toward the confusion between ethnic identity and spiritual identity. It requires a unique mindset to expand upon a physical reality to make an allegory to a spiritual one.
I hope it is clear to all that Jesus himself was an ethnic Jew, and that Christianity grew directly from his ministry. That the salvation for all ethnic Jews lay in the acceptance of the Christ. Unfortunately, modern Jewry, which is often atheist, secular, and lacking a moral compass, has a direct vested interest in continuing to propagate the narrative that ethnic Jews are the recipient of unjustified persecution. This narrative of persecution is the underlying justification for all kinds of actions, including but not limited to the holocaust on Palestinians.
The eternal victim sees themselves as justified in attacking back, in any way possible.
Thank you for making it more clear, the hate that modern Jewry reserves for Christianity.
Your pieces are really thought provoking, very well researched, and timely. I find it especially interesting, the Attacks on St. Paul, whose ministry, if I recall correctly, is still perceived as the seed for the Orthodox Church.
“I hope it is clear to all that Jesus himself was an ethnic Jew…”
No it is NOT clear to all that Jesus was an ethnic Jew. Not if you’re saying that ethnic Jews are of Khazarian stock. Tyron does a pretty good job of explaining this misconception in his comment below
and summarizes thusly: “Jesus was not a “Jew”, he was a Judaite from the tribe of Judah.”
Wolf, can you explain exactly why I would be saying that ethnic Jews are of K. stock?
Were there any K. Jews during the life of Jesus?
Let me help you with this, the answer to the question-NO.
Ok just makin sure. I usually resonate with your comments, Mike.
I guess the larger question for me is: what the heck would constitute an ‘ethnic Jew’ back then?
Jews were a collection of semi-nomadic tribes that had fallen under Roman rule in Jesus time. Rome really wasn’t interested in Judea, except as it related to control of the Mediterranean Sea, and the Oriental trade routes. Despite the rhetoric of Jews being a great warlike civilization, they collapsed quickly and blew away before the Legions.
Ethnic Jews during Jesus’ time were of that tribal stock that inhabited the area that roughly corresponds to Palestine today.
The ethnic Jews of Jesus time were doubtless similar in appearance to modern Palestinians. While the Arabs did indeed occupy Palestine, they never supplanted the Semitic inhabitants. Today’s Jews are primarily Eastern European of origin. Certainly this is the case for the predominate number of Jews occupying Palestine today.
Hagel nomination today,,,,,,”Filibusteros; from the Spanish – a term used to describe pirates that plundered in the seventeenth century”
Just about sums it up.
Wrong board – apologies Jonas.
Jonas,
That was in interesting write up in defense of modern Christianity and it contains many truths, however there are some things I must point out to correct your view that is polluted by the Judaizing of Christianity through the perversion of scriptures via Jewish publishing houses that promote liberalism and egalitarianism for everyone except “jews”.
You asked “Is the New Testament ‘Anti Semitic”? How can it be since the so called Jews are neither physical or spiritually Judah, Israel or even Semites? They are 95% Ashkenaz from Japeth (Genesis 10:3) and 5% of the remnant of the Roman slaughter that killed all the men and raped all the women. This is when the Jews who still wanted to maintain the illusion of them being from Jacob/Israel as well as undo their severing of paternal seed to Isaac to Abraham adopted a maternal lineage claim to be a “Jew” from hence forth. These so called Jews were from Esau-Edom who mixed with the Canaanites who mixed with the fallen ones.
“Ye are from beneath;(Satan’s domain is INSIDE the earth) I am from above: ye are of this world; I am not of this world.” — John 8:23.
When the Pharisees-“Jews” kept telling Jesus that “We be Abraham’s seed,” they also admitted that they were NEVER slaves. How could they be the house of Judah or the house of Israel (these are physical ethnic descriptions) if they were never slaves in Egypt?
33 They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?—John 8:33
As Pastor Eli James rightly points out “The proof that the Jews are not of Judah is contained in the Book of Revelation:
“I know the blasphemy of them that which say they are Jews, and are not, but are of the synagogue of Satan.” — Rev. 2:9.
“Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan who say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee.” — Rev. 3:9.
In Revelation 3:9, Jesus Christ is addressing His faithful followers. These followers cannot possibly be Jews, because the Jews have always denied Him. Jesus is saying that He will eventually make these liars come and worship at the feet of the Christians who are true to Him.
In both cases of this translation from the King James Version, the Greek word which is translated as ‘Jews’ is, in Strong’s Concordance, the word (2453) Ioudaios, meaning “belonging to the tribe of Judah,” and the word (2455) Ioudas, meaning the posterity of Judah. Interestingly, there is a related word, word number 2451, Ioudaikos, which is translated as “resembling a Judean, Jewish.” To “resemble” someone is not the same as being someone. One who resembles can easily impersonate the real thing. Since we must always distinguish between the real thing and something which resembles the real thing, we must have different words for these objects. Unfortunately, the word ‘Jews’ has been used for both groups.
So, the accurate translation of Rev. 2:9 is this:
“I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Judahites, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.” The Jews, who are in reality, Ioudaikos, not Ioudaios (impostors, not real), have been pretending to be Israelites since the Jewish Dispersion of 70 A.D.”
You said “Christianity has a place for everyone: Jew, Muslim, atheist, Buddhist, you name it.”
No, true Christianity does not. There is only ONE way to the father and that is through Jesus Christ. If one is called to the true Christ he is of Abraham’s seed (spiritual Christ) which denotes the physical seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob/Israel- the 12 tribes. Are there converts not of that lineage? Yes and they are to be extended the same rights as physical Israel within the faith.
You made a comment stating that Christianity was open to everyone. Misquoting there is no difference between Greek or “Jew” (Ioudaios, meaning “belonging to the tribe of Judah,”) but you do not understand that the word “gentile” means KINSFOLK nations-ethnic nations- not a non “Jew” as the fake Jews would have you believe. In this verse they are saying that the separation wall between the northern tribes of Israel and southern tribes of Judah has been demolished. Many Greeks at this time were descendents of the northern tribes who went into paganism. Christ was sent onto the house of Israel because Shiloh had come and the ruling authority had been given to Ephraim and Manasseh and it was taken from Judah and Levi of the south
.
This is made absolutely clear in Hebrews 8:8
8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: 9 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. 10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: (A ethnic people- a race)
You also said this “ethnicity ceases to have a major theological meaning” while trying to back it up with the Acts 26. If you read it in context from 24 to 26 however, you will see that while he made all the nations from one blood “Noah” but he also sets their times and boundaries of habitiation. (Boundaries of the different ethnic-religious nations). The proof is below:
Acts -24 God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; 25 Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; 26 And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;
In summary, Jesus was not a “Jew”, he was a Judaite from the tribe of Judah. The so called Jews were of Esau/Edom/Canaanites and today they include Ashkenaz from Japeth whom together are Gog and Magog. God loves as we should love and God does hate as we are to hate evil as well. God does open himself up for salvation to all peoples (Ethnic peoples) but the promises and blessings of dominion and fruitfulness from Adam to Noah to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob/Israel are the contract with physical Israelites/Judaites ONLY. The over comers containing 12,000 from each ETHNIC tribe of Israel/Judah make up the 144,000 in Revelation.
As Malachi 1 states concerning God’s love and God’s hatred:
Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord: yet I loved Jacob, 3 and hated Esau and laid waste his borders, and made his heritage as dwellings of the wilderness? 4 Because one will say, Idumea has been overthrown, but let us return and rebuild the desolate places (FAKE ISRAEL TODAY); thus saith the Lord Almighty, They shall build, but I will throw down; and they shall be called The borders of wickedness, and, The people against whom the Lord has set himself for ever.
WOW !!!
Jesus had already declared that they lied, so why should you take them seriously when they said that “they were never slaves”?
33 They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?—John 8:33
The conclusion that Jesus was an ethnic Jew again is from mainstream historians who have no interest in whether the New Testament is true or not. Moreover, there are indications of this throughout the New Testament. We are not talking about Jews hundreds of years after the life of Christ here.
Jonas,
You asked “Jesus had already declared that they lied, so why should you take them seriously when they said that “they were never slaves”?
Answer
Matthew 12: 36 But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. 37 For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. 38 Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee.
Luke 19: And he saith unto him, Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant. Thou knewest that I was an austere man, taking up that I laid not down, and reaping that I did not sow: 23
Job 15: 2 Will a wise man give for answer a mere breath of wisdom? and does he fill up the pain of his belly, 3 reasoning with improper sayings, and with words wherein is no profit? 4 Hast not thou moreover cast off fear, and accomplished such words before the Lord? 5 Thou art guilty by the words of thy mouth, neither hast thou discerned the words of the mighty. 6 Let thine own mouth, and not me, reprove thee: and thy lips shall testify against thee.
Encylopedia Brittanica
Herod was born in southern Palestine; his father, Antipater, was an Edomite (an Arab from the region between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba). Antipater was a man of great influence and wealth, who increased both by marrying the daughter of a noble from Petra (in southwestern Jordan), at that time the capital of the rising Nabataean kingdom. Thus Herod was, although a practicing Jew, of Arab origin on both sides.
Jonas, so are we to say the Judaites of Judea decided to make a Edomite their King which would be 100% against the commandments of the OT?
And thou shalt be a father of many nations.” — Gen. 17:4. What nations have the Jews founded?
Esau’s “Blessing” was a token one. This IS the controversy of Zion. It is between physical Jacob/Israel- 12 tribes and the Esau/Edomite “Jews”.
Here Issac gives his blessing to Esau-
“And by thy sword shalt thou live, and serve thy brother; and it shall come to pass when thou shalt have the dominion, that thou shalt break his yoke from off thy neck.” — Gen. 27:40 “And Esau hated Jacob” (verse 41)
In Deuteronomy 28:43 and 44, God tells us, Jacob/Israel, that we will be cursed if we do not obey His Law:
“The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee very high; and thou shalt come down very low. He shall lend to thee, and thou shalt not lend to him: he shall be the head and thou shalt be the tail.”.
Is that not want happened in Judea to the Judaites 2000 years ago and is not this happening in the White/European and kinsfolks Christian nations today?
Paul was the Apostle onto the “gentiles” (northern Israelites). Again, the separation between Esau/Edomite imposters and Jacob/Israelites (12 tribes) is expounded upon.
Romans9:1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, 2 That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. 3 For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh: 4 Who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; 5 Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. 6 Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel: 7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. 8 That is, They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. 9 For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son. 10 And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac; 11 (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;) 12 It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. 13 As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. 14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. 16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
(Esau is Edom is Idumean)
Herod was an Edomite, not a Judahite. He was an Idumean, not an Israelite.”Edom is in Jewry.” – Jewish Encyclopedia, 1925, Volume 5, p. 41.
I John 2:18-22 is especially revealing, with respect to those Idumeans, who lived among us, but are not OF us. Observe:
“Little children, it is the last time: and as you have heard that ANTICHRIST SHALL COME, even now THERE ARE MANY ANTICHRISTS; whereby we know that it is the last time. THEY (these antichrists) went out FROM us, but they were not OF us; for if they had been OF us, they would no doubt have continued WITH us: but they went OUT, that they might be made manifest that they were NOT all OF us.”
John Collett explains it this way
Judea and Galilee were two separate states and political entities, as illustrated on the map of Palestine in the time of our Saviour in your Bible. Jesus Himself was not a Jew (Judean) or resident of Judea, He was a Galilean or resident of Galilee (Matthew 26:69; John 7:41), and a Judahite or descendent of the Tribe of Judah. The Judeans of prominence were not of the Tribe of Judah, but of Edomites. Pilate was being ironic when he wrote the sign “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Judeans” for the Cross (John 19:19). That is, “the Galilean who was King of the Judeans,” as in “Queen Victoria of England, Empress of India.” Jesus grew up in Nazareth in Galilee. His disciples were fishermen from the Sea of Galilee. And although He visited Jerusalem, he spent most of His life in his home country of Galilee. John 7:1, “After this Jesus stayed in Galilee; for He could not walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill him.” His followers were constrained “for fear of the Jews” (John 7:13, 19:38, 20:19).
Why was this?
Psalm 83:3 says God’s elect are “hidden” or protected ones, and that they are under attack from a coalition of evil groups led by Edom. Who was Edom?
Esau, the brother of the patriarch Jacob, became the ancestor of the people called Edom, or Idumea. The Antiquities of the Jews by Flavius Josephus, XIII ix 1; XV vii 9 instructs us: John Hyrcanus forcibly assimilated the Edomites as a national group and they became “Jews” in about 120BC. The Jewish historian Josephus, who lived just after the time of Christ, wrote, “They [Edom] were hereafter no other than Jews’. The Jewish scholar Cecil Roth in his Concise Jewish Encyclopedia (1980) says on page 154, “John Hyrcanus forcibly converted [Edom] to Judaism. From then on they were part of the Jewish people. In the Talmud the name of Edom was applied to Christian Rome, and was then used for Christianity in general”.
Terrible judgements against Edom are made in most of the prophecies of the Old Testament. For instance, Isaiah 34, 63, Jeremiah 49, and the entire book of Obadiah.
The Edomite, Antipater, became the Procurator of Judea in 47BC. Ten years later his son Herod actually became “king of the Jews,” initiating the Edomite dynasty which ruled Palestine under Roman authority for over a hundred years. The Edomite assimilation opened the way for the virtual takeover along the lines predicted by Ezekiel and stimulus for an influx of population from the arid country of Edom into the more hospitable environment of Judea, an influx obviously encouraged for political reasons by the ruling Herodian dynasty. Edomites would have been appointed to the most influential positions, in order to extend and consolidate Edomite authority over the land and its people. Herod became notorious for his massacre of infant boys two years old and undger,” a supernaturally inspired attempt on the life of Christ (Matthew 2:16). Herod’s son Herod Antipas, continuing the work, and was responsible for the gruesome murder of John the Baptist (Matthew 14:6-12).
Hey Jonas, welcome to the amazing world of Tyronity. Jesus wasn’t a Jew, he was and Anglo Saxon, white guy.
White on,
Infidel
Gary, what do you think happens when you die? Nothing? That’s it? Consciousness stops?
I think you are going to be very pleasantly surprised. Innumerable Near Death Experiences reported by people of all persuasions would suggest that what lies beyond our mortal existence is very very REAL…much more so than this computer simulation called ‘life’ or whatever this is on planet earth.
Everyone,
The evidence to the race of Jesus is plain for all to see for those who seek the truth and hold truth at the highest regard.
1. Every single eye witness account that we have from Pilate to Roman Senate records say he had blue/grey eyes, blond-red hair. His skin was tawny by way of exposure. The “Jews” who opposed him had black hair, black beards and a natural tawny complexion. Everyone knew this up until recently when the “Jews” have used their media and Jewish controlled “Christian” pulpits to try to make people believe he was like the imposters “Jews” of today. If one believes in the shroud of Turin, if that ain’t a European/white man- what is?
2. We know from the scriptures that Jesus lived in Galilee among REAL Judaites while the Esau “Jews” such as Herod controlled Judea proper. These were two distinct populations. The Judaites a working class- the “Jews” hating any labor.
3. Shiloh came as predicted in Genesis, this was Christ Jesus. The ruling authority was taken from Judah and Levi and given to Ephraim and Manasseh. When the Israelites left Egypt, they left with the mixed multitude. Ephraim and Manasseh’s father was Joseph and he had an Egyptian Priestess as a wife. Hence, the 12 tribes of Israel were a mixture of Egyptian DNA and Israelite DNA. Because of this we know that if one wants to find Israelites in the world they would have to have a link to Egyptian DNA.
4. The “Jews” DNA tests trying to prove they are Judah/Israel NEVER have a control sample from the 12 patriarchs of Israel. They dig up some bones of someone who lived in the region (Esau-Canaanites-Assyrians-Romans-Babylonians-Arabs etc all lived in the area for periods of time) and try to use this to establish their “right” to have Palestine. Or, the “Jews” simple using their own stock as a control sample and say anyone who matches it is a Jew. Both methods are completely fraudulent as one might expect from this lot.
5. Recent DNA tests have been done on King Tut. They found that people indigenous to the UK have a 80 % match where as people from Germany have a 50% match and the further east you go among the white populations, this match decreases. White/European and kinsfolk people are the ONLY people on the planet with this DNA match.
6. The Welsh language is 80% ORIGINAL Hebrew and the early Saxon/Germanic language is 50% ORIGINAL Hebrew.
7. The archeological, biblical and historical record of the migration of the 10 northern tribes with 4/5ths of Judaite tribes starting around 721 BC is absolutely clear. The records show, beyond a doubt, these Israelites broke from of the Assyrians and flooded into an almost empty Europe around 650 BC through “Israel’s Pass” in the Caucasian mountains.
8. Christ was sent onto the house of Israel and he made a NEW CONTRACT (Hebrews 8:8) with the house of Israel and house of Judah to have dominion and fruitfulness over all peoples. Where did the word spread and who has controlled the world for the last 2000 years until the rise of Gog-Magog-Esau-Ashkenaz “Jews” in the last days of this particular age? The white/European and kinsfolk peoples and nations. Does anyone actually doubt this? If one looks at the biblical markers to identify Christ’s kin..Israel/Judah they ONLY fit ONE particular people as described above. If anyone wants to try and show different, by all means- go for it!
Esau is ALWAYS the end of each age and Jacob is ALWAYS the beginning of the next!
Expect a remnant of Jacob/Israel to defeat these so called Jews and rule with the true Christ to come. The sun may go down and we may be living in darkness right now, but the sun ALWAYS rises and has dominion over the dark.
Gee Tyron, where have I seen this before. Do you think you can just repeat this crap and it will be true? Oh yeah, that’s how propaganda works isn’t it. There were NO eye witness reports of lovely Jesus. NONE. If you have something genuine, you would be on the front page of TIME and every other publicaton that just loves religious malarkey. You would be a star. But you are not are you, Tyron? You are just an idiot on the internet. I will prey for you.
The end is Rear,
Infidel
The following was taken from a manuscript in the possession of Lord Kelly, and in his library, and was copied from an original letter of Publius Lentullus at Rome. It being the usual custom of Roman Governors to advertise the Senate and people of such material things as happened in their provinces in the days of Tiberius Caesar, Publius Lentullus, President of Judea, wrote the following epistle to the Senate concerning the Nazarene called Jesus.
“There appeared in these our days a man, of the Jewish Nation, of great virtue, named Yeshua [Jesus], who is yet living among us, and of the Gentiles is accepted for a Prophet of truth, but His own disciples call Him the Son of God- He raiseth the dead and cureth all manner of diseases. A man of stature somewhat tall, and comely, with very reverent countenance, such as the beholders may both love and fear, his hair of (the colour of) the chestnut, full ripe, plain to His ears, whence downwards it is more orient and curling and wavering about His shoulders. In the midst of His head is a seam or partition in His hair, after the manner of the Nazarenes. His forehead plain and very delicate; His face without spot or wrinkle, beautified with a lovely red; His nose and mouth so formed as nothing can be reprehended; His beard thickish, in colour like His hair, not very long, but forked; His look innocent and mature; His eyes grey, clear, and quick- In reproving hypocrisy He is terrible; in admonishing, courteous and fair spoken; pleasant in conversation, mixed with gravity. It cannot be remembered that any have seen Him Laugh, but many have seen Him Weep. In proportion of body, most excellent; His hands and arms delicate to behold. In speaking, very temperate, modest, and wise. A man, for His singular beauty, surpassing the children of men”
This is a reprinting of a letter from Pontius Pilate to Tiberius Caesar describing the physical appearance of Jesus. Copies are in the Congressional Library in Washington, D.C.
TO TIBERIUS CAESAR:
A young man appeared in Galilee preaching with humble unction, a new law in the Name of the God that had sent Him. At first I was apprehensive that His design was to stir up the people against the Romans, but my fears were soon dispelled. Jesus of Nazareth spoke rather as a friend of the Romans than of the Jews. One day I observed in the midst of a group of people a young man who was leaning against a tree, calmly addressing the multitude. I was told it was Jesus. This I could easily have suspected so great was the difference between Him and those who were listening to Him. His golden colored hair and beard gave to his appearance a celestial aspect. He appeared to be about 30 years of age. Never have I seen a sweeter or more serene countenance. What a contrast between Him and His bearers with their black beards and tawny complexions! Unwilling to interrupt Him by my presence, I continued my walk but signified to my secretary to join the group and listen. Later, my secretary reported that never had he seen in the works of all the philosophers anything that compared to the teachings of Jesus. He told me that Jesus was neither seditious nor rebellious, so we extended to Him our protection. He was at liberty to act, to speak, to assemble and to address the people. This unlimited freedom provoked the Jews — not the poor but the rich and powerful.
Later, I wrote to Jesus requesting an interview with Him at the Praetorium. He came. When the Nazarene made His appearance I was having my morning walk and as I faced Him my feet seemed fastened with an iron hand to the marble pavement and I trembled in every limb as a guilty culprit, though he was calm. For some time I stood admiring this extraordinary Man. There was nothing in Him that was repelling, nor in His character, yet I felt awed in His presence. I told Him that there was a magnetic simplicity about Him and His personality that elevated Him far above the philosophers and teachers of His day.
Now, Noble Sovereign, these are the facts concerning Jesus of Nazareth and I have taken the time to write you in detail concerning these matters. I say that such a man who could convert water into wine, change death into life, disease into health; calm the stormy seas, is not guilty of any criminal offense and as others have said, we must agree — truly this is the Son of God.
Your most obedient servant,
Pontius Pilate
Another description of Jesus is found in “The Archko Volume” which contains official court documents from the days of Jesus. This information substantiates that He came from racial lines which had blue eyes and golden hair. In a chapter entitled “Gamaliel’s Interview” it states concerning Jesus (Yeshua) appearance:
“I asked him to describe this person to me, so that I might know him if I should meet him. He said: ‘If you ever meet him [Yeshua] you will know him. While he is nothing but a man, there is something about him that distinguishes him from every other man. He is the picture of his mother, only he has not her smooth, round face. His hair is a little more golden than hers, though it is as much from sunburn as anything else. He is tall, and his shoulders are a little drooped; his visage is thin and of a swarthy complexion, though this is from exposure. His eyes are large and a soft blue, and rather dull and heavy….’ This Jew [Nazarite] is convinced that he is the Messiah of the world. …this was the same person that was born of the virgin in Bethlehem some twenty-six years before…”
- The Archko Volume, translated by Drs. McIntosh and Twyman of the Antiquarian Lodge, Genoa, Italy, from manuscripts in Constantinople and the records of the Senatorial Docket taken from the Vatican of Rome (1896) 92-93
Jonas,
You also said
“The conclusion that Jesus was an ethnic Jew again is from mainstream historians who have no interest in whether the New Testament is true or not”
Answer
Almost all mainstream historians like scientists alike, MUST follow the rules of the Political Correctness from the Jewish Marxist Frankfort School. If they do not, they will NOT have a job anymore. You know it and I know it. Do you want to sit there are actually claim that a mainstream historian would EVER come out and say that white/European kinsfolk peoples and Christian nations are the true Israel/Judah of the bible? Why don’t you give me an example of a mainstream historian who would NOT lose his job or even worse if he or she did so. I have offered undeniable proof and if you want some more, I will by all means give you links to this evidence and other such evidence that cannot be denied by any rational, reasonable mind. No one really EVER disputes the evidence when presented. They simply fall back on name calling (not you) as a way to marginalize those presenting the evidence. Same thing is true with the massive evidence that the white man was the first in the Americas. The evidence is overwhelming but do you see any mainstream archeologists openly supporting these established facts?
Things to ponder during your perusal
Oh, and Jonas, did you know that the Jews actually switched the names of Jesus’ mom and her cousin, Elisabeth. Yeah, Jesus’ real mom was Elisabeth, Queen Elisabeth. Tyron can prove it with genuine Bible quotes from Genesis to Revelations. Hallelujah. You just have to overlook the fact that we have no originals of anything in the Bible, none. And forget about Revelations being written by a psychopath on LSD,. The beauty of the Bible is that we can validate anything, even honkey Jesus, as long as you, “become as little children.”(MT. 18:3-4)
Amen,
Infidel
Hey Walker,
I appreciate your response and it is all right to pour out your vitriol here, but at least have some courtesy. I honestly thought that an Infidel of your rank should conduct himself much better than that, and this is why I have been ignoring some of your responses. And I hope you read what “Ordinary Serf” has said about being fair.
Leaving the diatribe aside, you state that “we have no originals of anything in the Bible, none.” How primitive it would be if historians adopt this risible approach to history. We don’t have the original of anything in ancient history (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, you name it), therefore Plato and Aristotle did not exist!
Once again, I am pleading with you to have some respect for the views you are criticizing. To say things like the book of Revelations was written “by a psychopath on LSD” is certainly below the belt. Thank you.
Why is your site more than 90% about Israel and Jews? Perhaps you are inadvertantly playing with the psyche of your readers. Remember that you have to try to be not a one trick pony. Israel is only a few million people on a minsucle piece of land. If the weto take away their patronage today tomorrow there will be no country. So I wonder if is well meaning or foolish to jump on every word of their third tier leaders.
Nasir
Israel and the jews are basically driving everyone’s agenda, that’s why
Thanks for the comment. Playing with the psyche of my readers? How did you come to that conclusion? You indirectly make the point that since Israel is a small country, then its political power over America must be ignored. Perhaps you may want to talk to Chuck Hagel about this. Here is a man who stands up for America and for the Constitution, but because he does not bow down to the Israeli policy, he was labeled an anti-Semite, a Jew hater, and a bigot. More than 200 articles have been written to denounce him just because he stood up with the Founding Fathers of America. In your estimation, does Iran have that kind of power? Can any country in the Middle East impose its agenda on the vast majority of the American people?
Moreover, you seem to ignore the massive death and massive debt that the war in Iraq alone has given us. According to economist Joseph E. Stiligtz, the war in Iraq alone is going to cost America at least $3 trillion! This doesn’t count Afghanistan, Syria, and other places. Should we as Americans simply ignore this as if everything is going fine? Now the neoconservatives want a war with Iraq. I am sorry to say it, but this is wicked, and someone has to say enough.
Or want a war with Iran ( ? ) My comment above, I reposted on Gordon’s article…..but actually agree with you about Hagel and what they have done to him, so perhaps it wasn’t so out of place here.
Right on Jonas. I totally agree with you here.
Carry on,
Infidel
$3 trillion cost of wars with Iraq? & WHO PAID THIS?
Didn’t we charge the Iraqi’s millions of dollars for every bomb we dropped on them & thousands of dollars for every bullet we fired on them?
$3 trillion = $3,000,000,000,000. Divided by 3,000,000 casualties = $1,000,000. per man, woman, and child we murdered or maimed & we charged it to them by looting everything valuable especially their oil for the rest of history? (Amounting to over 200 billion barrels):
************http://www.ogj.com/articles/print/vol-110/issue-3/exploration-development/hydrocarbon-reservoir.html
A Game As Old As Empire
The Secret World of Economic Hit Men and the Web of Global Corruption Edited by Steven Hiatt
************http://www.bkconnection.com/static/agaoesampler.pdf
From: **********http://platformlondon.org/shop/
Lastly: a typical “U.S. economist” is a “CON-ARTIST” & a counterfeiter of values just like our counterfeit economy & counterfeit dollars today which is why they report crap about these wars costing us zillions of dollars instead of telling facts.
I had hoped that people who read or write on this site can parse simple sentences. Your equivocation of “your site” with your “own article” tells me that I have to use legalese. My comment was made to the VT editors and not to you. I did not comment on your article at all. Frankly, I am disappointed. I am not going to read your article: if you cannot read, how can you write?
Sincerely
Nasir
If I may say so, that is slightly unfair Nasir. True enough, Alexis has made a similar error in responding to other comments on his articles (eg. Stewart Ogilby a few articles back). However, you have to take this in context – that context being that the many of the writers here have to work for a living and also in their spare time generously contribute extensive pieces (in an attempt to stimulate debate) and in many cases also take the time to engage with the commentators on each article. Regardless of this, you are equally at fault on the parse front……perhaps you should have written ‘this site’ as the VT does not belong to this particular writer ie. your own statement is easily misinterpreted.
That’s a name typo above by the way and it looks disrespectful. Apologies, I would normally say ‘Mr Alexis’ or ‘Jonas’ although I note the author does address Gary by his surname…..but that is understandable given the nature of his comments on here – he reminds me of another poster by the name of Jackson, who has since gone as far as I know. The comment section has vastly improved since the VT troll purge a month or so back.
In the ADL/B’nai B’rith world, anti-Semitism = hate. If we want to discuss hate among religions, there is no religion more hateful than Judaism. Their religious leaders continually promote hatred of all non-Jews.
http://www.theoccidentalobserver.net/2010/11/letter-from-camp-croc/
As for the US Constitution being anti-Semitic, if it truly is, it would be a clear indication that the founding fathers understood the pernicious effect of the followers of Judaism. The good old USA ain’t what it used to be.
& don’t forget Jews were expelled from England & many other lands for getting caught practicing what they named “HOLOCAUST” which is documented in this film as murder & cannibalism of non-Jews:
Ritual Murder Revisited: The Hidden Cult (Full Version)
***********************http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-LjcC9aJII
Oprah revealed while “WE THE SHEEPLE” continue to sleep:
*******************http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImoZv1rprc0
Anti-Semitism is nothing more than a label used to denigrate people who display a natural desire to survive. Not even worth talking about.
Jonas,
As I wonder how you can pour out vitriol with some courtesy, I deny it is vitriol. It is ridicule, but when you ridicule any religulous notions, you have crossed the invisible line. Is this because religions, the god ones, are based on nothing and the sheep know it? Is this why the New Testament, just as the Hebrew Bible, is loaded with vitriol? It is anti Jew and anti human.
There seems to be a bit of a double standard here too. There have been a few ad hominems hurled in my direction, but I don’t cry for the censor. I am used to vitriol from Xtians. It is the way of their “master.”
“bring hither those enemies of mine, that would not have me reign over them, and slay them before me.” (Luke 19:27) New Testament Xtians are not happy with just vitriol, they bring out the sticks and stones. Is this because they can’t handle the truth?
Agape,
Infidel
And by the way Jonas, you can look up that Lentulus crap on Wikipedia and see that it is a fraud.
That won’t stop my friend Tyron from repeating it though.
Happy trails to you,
Infidel
And one more thing Jonas, I stand by my comment on the author of Revelations. Have you read Revelations? Here is what Tommy Jefferson said about it, “It has been 50 and 60 years since I have read the Apocalypse, and I then considered it merely the ravings of a maniac.”
I am sorry you are offended Jonas, but I call em like I see em. Have some mercy on me, after all, I have been condemned to utter oblivion or something like that.
Happy trails to you,
Infidel