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A Stumbling‐block for Jews and Folly for Gentiles
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2024
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The Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris, two Carmelite friars living on the top of Mount Carmel in the Holy Land, a few Dominican friars, and some 200,000 other Christians, clerical and lay, share something special with me which marks us out, in some respects, from our other brothers and sisters in Christ. We are all bom and bred Jewish, and we share this characteristic with all the apostles, with the Mother of our Lord, and with our Lord himself. Some of us are more aware of our Jewish background than others, and some of us are more deeply steeped in the traditions of Rabbinical Judaism than others of our group. Are we ex- Jews, people who have abandoned their Jewish identity by accepting Jesus as our Messiah, or do we remain Jewish in Christ? I believe that we remain Jewish in Christ, and that Christ calls us to strengthen, to nurture and to cherish our Jewish identity within his body, the Church. There are many people who disagree with this proposition. There have long been Christians who believe that Jews are called to abandon their Jewish identity when they are baptised into Christ, and who see the persistence of Jewish identity among baptised Christians as an affront to our Lord. For such people, my belief in the persistence of my Jewishness and in the importance of the Jewish identity of people like me is folly at best and apostasy at worst. Many Jews concur with this view, albeit from a different angle, viewing all Jews who become Christians as apostates who have abandoned any identification with the Jewish people and have joined hands with those who have persecuted them and murdered them. The baptism of Jews, on their account, is a bar to fellowship, a stumbling-block. I would like to essay a discussion of Jewish-Christian identity and its dilemmas within the Church.
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- Copyright © 1992 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
References
1 Acts 15:1–29.
2 See Acts 2:46, 3:1, 5:21 and 21:26, for example.
3 See Acts 9:20, 13:5, 13:14, 14:1, 17:1, 17:10 and 19:8, for example.
4 Versions of the benediction currently used in the synagogue‐liturgy no longer excoriate Christians, and could be recited by Christians in good conscience. See Sante, Carmine Di, Jewish Prayer: The Origins of Christian Liturgy (N.Y.: Paulist Press, 1991), pp. 107–112Google Scholar.
5 See Martyn, J.L, History and Theology in the Fourth Gospel (Nashville: Abingdon, 1979)Google Scholar.
6 Epistle to the Magnesians 10, 3.
7 See, for example, Canon 8 of the Second Council of Nicaea in 787; chapter 70 of the constitutions of the Fourth Lateran Council; and sundry paragraphs (DS 1348, 1350, 1351) of the Decree for the Jacobites of the Council of Florence in 1442.
8 A translation of the relevant section can be found with the addition of an embarrassed explanatory gloss in Neuner, J. SJ and Dupuis, J. SJ, The Christian Faith in the Doctrinal Documents of the Catholic Church, (Glasgow: Collins, 1983), p. 305fGoogle Scholar.
9 Dictionary of Moral Theology, compiled under the direction of Francesco Cardinal Roberti, Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the apostolic Signature, edited under the direction of Monsignor Pietro Palazzini, Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of the Council, and translated under the direction of Henry J. Yannone, S.T.L (London: Burns & Oates, 1962). It was published in Italy in 1957.
10 It is perhaps also telling that Nostra Aetate, which began its life as a proposal for a Decree of the Second Vatican Council on the Jews, met with considerable resistance which very nearly caused it to be abandoned. See Osterreicher, John M., ‘Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non‐Christian Religions’, in Vorgrimler, Herbert (ed.), Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, vol. 3 (London and N.Y.: Bums & Oates/Herder and Herder, 1969), pp. 1–136Google Scholar, for a fascinating account of the vicissitudes of successive drafts of the document.
11 I do not wish to suggest that all Trotskyites are dogmatic, sectarian or even wedded to atheism.
12 I should perhaps add that this sectarian rejection of the ANC, which has fought longer and more consistently than any other for a just order in South Africa, and which has earned the loyalty of a large proportion of South Africans, was a folly of my youth. I have long been a supporter of the ANC.
13 I have learnt a great deal from Fr Elias about the theology of Jewish‐Christian identity in particular. In fairness to him I should note, however, that my views on the matter have me to differ from his in a number of respects, and his views should therefore not be judged to suffer from the weaknesses which might be found in my views on this matter. I am sceptical about what he calls his ‘prophetic hermeneutic’, which views certain contemporary events such as the establishment of the State of Israel as signs of the times and the fulfilment of New Testament prophecies, and do not accept the apocalyptic determinism and view of prophecy which appear to inform this hermeneutic. I cannot accept that the establishment of the State of Israel and its actions are of eschatological significance at all. I am also of the view that his characterisation of the decline of religious commitment in Europe and the United States as ‘the apostasy of the gentiles’ is somewhat overstated. I would not wish to say that the Jewish sages and their traditions after Christ are without religious authority or validity, and that they have been superseded absolutely by the teaching of the Church. In practical terms, the Jewish‐Christian framework which I believe to be needed is also somewhat more modest than the full‐blown rite which Fr Elias seeks. I have no objection at all in principle to the notion of a Jewish‐Catholic rite, provided that it is not elitist in intra‐Christian terms, that it is not committed to the eschatological hallowing of the State of Israel and its actions, that it formally commit its members to strive to be accepting. dialogical and non‐proselytising in its attitude to Jews who are not Christian, and that it seek reconciliation with such Jews.
14 Jn 1.14.
15 The term ‘Torah’ refers primarily to God's revelation to Israel in the canon of Hebrew scripture, though it is sometimes used by Judaism in a narrower, and sometimes in a broader sense. In its narrower sense, it refers to the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible. In its broadest sense, it refers to the entire revealed religious tradition of Judaism, written and oral.
16 Jn. 1. 2f.
17 This view is not without adherents among New Testament scholars. Some time after coming to this conclusion, I heard this view enunciated in a lecture delivered at Oxford by W.D. Davies.
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