Re: Fwd: Re: Passion Plays and Jewish Music

[Allen Davis <adavis...>]

You're right -- it's an extreme, brittle statement of the reality. I never 
have said things like that in my life, bound by norms of civility and 
liberal tolerance, hoping against hope that people of all religions can put 
aside what they've been taught, and just get along. But especially at a 
time when we see the impact of education in some of the Islamic world and 
its role in perpetrating vioence, I find myself under the spell of James 
Carroll's great book, Constantine's Sword -- The Church and the Jews. In 
it, Carroll (a former priest, liberation theologian, associate of the 
Berrigans etc., practicing Catholic, and a leading voice of reform in the 
Christian world) argues passionately for the kind of reinvention of his 
religion that makes it possible for true reconciliation with Jews and other 
faiths. He calls for a Vatican III that finishes the work begun with 
Vatican II, and addresses the foundations of hatred and persecution, 
including rewriting the gospels (not as quixotic as it might appear -- 
there seems to be quite a bit of support for this), a new "Christology", 
democratization of the institution of the Church, and true repentance that 
must include positive action, not just verbal apology.

The formulation of Christianity as a "cult of death" not mine -- it's 
Carroll's summary of many scholars' and theologians' work (the book has a 
great bibliography, and thousands of notes) , most of them Christians (the 
"innate depravity" part of the statement was not meant to say that the 
Christian relion is innately deprafed! It was my inadequate shortcut for 
talking about the Christian conception of humans as sinners, and the body 
as flawed, evil), and is shared by many Christian theologians, apparently. 
That is, it is a religion that came eventually to be  built (in great part 
because of political exigency and the blurring of temporal and spiritual 
power of the Church) on the basis of violent human sacrifice -- the cross 
(the torture instrument) became the dominant symbol, and from Constantine 
onward became the symbol and banner under which great violence was visited 
upon pagans and Jews. (Carroll frames the book with a brilliant discussions 
of the outrage of the cross/crosses and the Carmelite nuns at Auschwitz, 
and the Edith Stein story). There are other aspects of the Jesus story -- 
love, tolerance, peace -- none of which were given enough emphasis to serve 
as a counterweight to the dominance of the cross (apparently the early 
Eastern Church focused more on the resurrection side than the torture side 
of the story).

Much of this is new to me, and I know that I'm not doing the arguments 
justice, but for anyone interested in this development in Christian 
theology, and a real (not superficial, as in the current Pope's "apology") 
basis for tolerance, reconciliation, and mutual respect, I highly recommend 
Carroll's book, now out in paper. Far from "sabotaging the potential for 
peace", Carroll has convinced me that accepting the full force of the 
history is the only way to build bridges with any authenticity and staying 
power (I think it is the impulse behind South Africa's reconciliation 
process, as imperfect as it is). Leaving the foundation unchanged creates 
the potential for further violence. In fact, we will be inviting him to 
speak at our synagogue next year, and hope to get some churches to 
co-sponsor the meeting. And we will provide music from both traditions to 
help build the bridges that this is all about, including  things from the 
middle ages that can demonstrate the common heritage of the traditions, ala 
"The Sacred Bridge".

By the way, I never suggested that naziism was a "Christian" movement! But 
without the foundation, the fertile ground, German (or for that matter 
French, or European in general) readiness to accept murderous antisemitism 
and anti-Judaism, naziism could not have flourished. Carroll does a 
brilliant job describing the extent to which the Catholic Church, which 
could have stopped or changed the course of the movement (the way it did 
with Kulturkampf), did not, but in fact supported it in chilling ways, and 
the extent to which historic Lutheran anti-Judaism and antisemitism 
fertilized the ground.


> >
> >
> >The centrality of the crucifixion itself  in Christian theology, while 
> not "anti-semitic", is opposed at its core to the Jewish way of being and 
> relating to divinity. By focusing on that part of the story, Christianity 
> became a cult of death, violence, and innate depravity, and Judaism 
> became the perfect foil, the "negative other" that served murderers in 
> the name of God very well for two thousand years, and counting.
> >
> >Allen
> >adavis (at) softwarejobs(dot)com
> >
>
>Don't you think this really a bit much? You're basically saying that one 
>of the great religions of the world, responsible for atrocities against 
>Jews but nevertheless also for the civilization of countless people, is "a 
>cult of death, violence, and innate depravity..."
>
>I couldn't help but wonder what the Jewish reaction would be if someone 
>said that about our religion.
>
>Christians focus on the crucifixion usually as a prelude to resurrection. 
>That's why there is a Good Friday (crucifixion) and Easter 
>Sunday  (resurrection). Just because we Jews appear to have little 
>interest in the afterlife, it gives us no reason to criticize another 
>religion that does.
>
>And just to set the record straight: the Nazis were not Christians. They 
>successfully eliminated any Lutheran opposition ca. 1937-38. I am aware 
>that the Catholic Church and Pope Pius' toleration of the Nazis was 
>despicable and cost many Jewish lives. But, perhaps, we can build on the 
>recent overtures to us made by Pope John Paul. Sure, it's still very late 
>in the game, but why not try to establish peace and dialogue if we can?
>
>We should never forget the injustices of the past, but it's utter 
>foolishness to try and sabotage a potential for peace and good will in the 
>future.
>
>Eliott Kahn
>
>

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