Heads or Tails for South African Jewry?


Revd Canon Peter Houston is Rector: St Agnes Church (Durban) and Canon Theologian: [Anglican] Diocese of Natal.

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Abstract

Islamophobia and antisemitism are likened to two sides of the same coin. While there are considerable similarities in definitions, such as a fear-based response to the Other, the implications differ considerably between countries. Under certain conditions, antisemitic attitudes turn into actions. The current convergence of these dynamics, combined with the social, political and economic stressors of the COVID-19 national lockdown, raises a warning flag. This paper argues that if the metaphoric coin is flipped, thanks to the religious weighting of the church and political weighting of the apartheid Israel narrative, it will in all probability land facedown to the detriment of South African Jewry.

Introduction

The notion that Islamophobia and antisemitism are two sides of the same coin is popular. Contemporary expressions are both rooted in a form of racism. The term ‘Islamophobia’ is a relative newcomer to the discourse and does not have the longer history and acceptance of terms such as ‘racism’ or ‘antisemitism.’[1] Brian Klug provides a useful dissection of both terms, asserting that:

‘Jew’ and ‘Muslim’ share the logic of the Other. Sharing the same form, they share the same general logic. The specific logic of antisemitism and Islamophobia, however, is determined by the content of the concepts. That is to say, in each case, there is a particular bigoted discourse, and this discourse is shaped by the particular traits that make up the figures of ‘Jew’ and Muslim’ respectively.[2]

Early definitions of Islamophobia, as with many definitions of antisemitism, have been critiqued for being particularly unwieldy and impossible to quantity. The UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance defined Islamophobia as: “A baseless hostility and fear vis-à-vis Islam, and as a result, a fear of, and aversion towards, all Muslims or the majority of them. [Islamophobia] also refers to the practical consequences of this hostility in terms of discrimination, prejudices, and unequal treatment of which Muslims (individuals and communities) are victims and their exclusion from major political and social spheres”.[3] This definition captures the fear of Muslims from earlier definitions but picks up on the practical consequences that Muslims face. The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation’s Observatory on Islamophobia, the Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research, the Open Society Institute, Center for American Progress, Runnymede Trust and individual academics continue to seek better definitions.[4] In many respects, Islamophobia cannot be separated from modern antisemitism because they share remarkably similar traits, most noticeably racism based on perceived racial features, ethnic appearances, and cultural practices.[5] Reuven Firestone makes the link to fear, noting that although Islamophobia is a recently coined term, it refers to a long history of fear and hatred of Muslims in the West that, like antisemitism, has had a long time to become implanted into the collective Western psyche.[6]

A definition of antisemitism is equally hard to quantify, but the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief recommends the use of the following working definition adopted by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA): “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities”.[7]

While this discussion on defining Islamophobia and antisemitism can be prolonged and show how they are two sides to the same coin, yet have differences, the aim of this paper is to delve deeper into the context of antisemitism to demonstrate why, if the metaphoric coin is flipped in South Africa, it is likely to fall facedown to the detriment of the Jews.

God Bless Palestine, Free All From Oppression

On 26 September 2019 the provincial synod of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA), condemning in the strongest terms all forms of Islamophobia and antisemitism, passed a resolution calling on Anglicans to support the Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanction (BDS) movement, noting that the situation in Israel and Palestine can be described, in some respects, as being worse than apartheid South Africa. Central to the argument is that ‘the current political nation state of Israel and Israel in the Bible should not be confused with each other, and neither should the ideology of Zionism and the religion of Judaism be conflated.’[8] Anglicans were asked to adapt the Prayer for Africa (‘God bless Africa, guide her leaders, guard her children and give her peace. Amen’) and pray, ‘God bless Palestine, Free all from oppression; and bring justice and peace. Amen.’ BDS-SA quickly leveraged the ACSA resolution to their cause, stating that ‘Palestinian Christians, descendants of the first followers of Christ, insist that they, together with all Palestinians, share the same suffering under Israel’s regime of Apartheid.’[9]

This is not isolated. I have Anglican clergy colleagues making statements like ‘Jesus is a Palestinian’ and ‘the earliest followers of Jesus were Palestinians.’ They frame the Palestinians as being the indigenous people or first nation of Palestine by asserting that the modern Jews of Israel are not the Jews of the bible. An elderly minister told me that today’s Jews stem from Judas, which is an ancient antisemitic teaching of the church and a longstanding stereotype found in Christian religious art.

South African Chief Rabbi, Warren Goldstein angrily condemned the ACSA resolution as being morally offensive and the Anglican support of BDS as antisemitic. Most offensive seems to be the church deciding what is biblical or not, hitting an ancient nerve. Goldstein remarked, ‘This is beyond the pale. The audacity to make pronouncements on what Judaism is and is not is beyond their right.’[10] But it is a right that the church has presumed to exercise from the earliest of times and on this I want to dwell to show why Islamophobia and antisemitism in South Africa cannot be equated.

Acknowledging My Personal Bias

As a personal aside and to acknowledge my own bias, I grew-up thinking that the Jewish Jesus of the Christian church was just like me, a white-Western English-speaking male. My Sunday school upbringing formed this stereotype. Before I embarked on a personal journey in relation to antisemitism, my understanding of Christianity and Judaism would have confirmed Abraham Joshua Heschel’s assertion that my faith reflected a ‘dejudaization of Christianity, affecting the church’s way of thinking and its inner life.’[11] What Heschel goes on to describe in detail, I grew up believing, that:

Judaism is a religion of law, Christianity a religion of grace; Judaism teaches a God of wrath, Christianity a God of love; Judaism a religion of slavish obedience, Christianity the conviction of free men; Judaism is particularism, Christianity is universalism; Judaism seeks work-righteousness, Christianity preaches faith-righteousness; The teaching of the old covenant a religion of fear, the gospel of the new covenant a religion of love. The Hebrew Bible is preparation; the gospel fulfillment. In the first is immaturity, in the second perfection; in the one you find narrow tribalism, in the other all-embracing charity.[12]

This is still the message coming from many contemporary church pulpits, while very little is ever said about Mohammed (PBUH) and Islam, because our belief systems do not intersect nor do our sacred scriptures. If Islamophobia does exist in churches, it comes from more indirect sources, perhaps when praying for persecuted churches and noting the plight of Christians in some Muslim countries. Something I have had to be confronted with is what Marvin Wilson outlines: “In today’s Church, the often sordid and self-indicting story of animosity, enmity, and strife directed by Christians toward Jews remains generally untold. Perhaps this is the case because the history of the Church is about as long as the history of the evils directed towards the Jews – if not in the overt acts of Christians, certainly in their guilty silence”.[13]

The Church and the Denigration of Judaism

Both anti-Judaism and antisemitism have occupied a major portion of Jewish history.[14] In the narrowest sense, anti-Judaism is a religious viewpoint towards Jews and Judaism. Antisemitism, on the other hand, is a term that originated in the latter half of the 19th Century and described anti-Jewish campaigns in Europe.[15] It has negative racial connotations. It came to describe retrospectively the hostility and hatred directed towards Jews since before the Christian era but especially in the history of the church. Anti-Judaism and antisemitism are twin phenomena that feed off each other; Christian religious hostility towards Judaism correlates to societal hostility towards Jews.[16]

In the B’rit Chadashah the anti-Judaism polemic was an intra-family device used by Jews to win other Jews to the Way (fledgling Christian movement), whereas in the hands of the goyim in the second century onwards it became antisemitic.[17] When the early Jewish believers of the Way addressed their Jewish brethren with the harshest words of the Jewish prophets, they did so in the tradition of Jewish self-criticism.[18] This changed when the preaching passed into the hands of goyim who did not have a deep sense of solidarity with Israel.[19] A shift occurred towards the negation of all things Jewish.[20] Oskar Skarsaune notes the fragility of the Christian position once it became largely goyim: The Christians were newcomers with no pre-history, and they were painfully aware of it. The rabbis handed on a tradition of scriptural exegesis which could claim the authority of generations of excellent teachers, reaching all the way back to Moses on Mount Sinai… and there was a basic consistency in their approach to the bible: they not only recognized the Torah as Divine, they also observed it.[21]


Ecclesia and Synagoga ('Church and Synagogue'), Strasbourg Cathedral

Ecclesia and Synagoga ('Church and Synagogue'), Strasbourg Cathedral

Thus it was impossible for a religious movement coming out of Judaism to expound Christianity without reference to and comparison with Judaism.[22] This required an encounter with Judaism on doctrinal grounds as well as from the standpoint of history and contemporary relations, whereas Judaism could be expounded without theological reference to, or comparison with, Christianity.[23] This latter observation about Judaism equally applies to the encounter between Christianity and Islam, where both can co-exist without needing to reference the Other. Judaism was consigned to the scrapheap of church history, behind Christianity’s advancement. Heschel notes this reality and is worth quoting at length for the force of his argument: “The Christian message, which in its origins intended to be an affirmation and culmination of Judaism, became very early diverted into a repudiation and negation of Judaism; obsolescence and abrogation of Jewish faith became conviction and doctrine; the new covenant was conceived not as a new phase or disclosure but as abolition and replacement of the ancient one; theological thinking fashioned its terms in a spirit of antitheses to Judaism. Contrast and contradiction rather than acknowledgment of roots relatedness and indebtedness, became the perspective”.[24] Christianity thus distanced itself and dis-identified itself from Judaism.[25] But moreover, an anti-Jewish attitude formed an integral part of the testimony and self-identity of the Christian church.[26]

Marcion was one of first serious heretics of the church. He wanted a Christianity free from any vestige of Judaism.[27] In combating Marcion, the church accentuated its anti-Jewish stance by emphasising it was because the Jews were particularly prone to sin that God dealt with them differently in history.[28] Christian apologetics against Marcion resulted in a heightened hostility towards the Jews.[29] This would not be the last time Jews would be caught up and become victims of intra-church conflicts. The argument from history was the church’s trump card. Keith summarises it as follows: Christians made this the centrepiece of their argument, contending that the hand of God had been made manifest in history since the time of Jesus in various calamities that had befallen the Jews and the successes that had attended the Christian gospel in the gentile world.[30]

Robert Michael argues that the Jews served several important functions for the Church Fathers as they re-interpreted history with respect to the existence of the church:

  • The failures of the Judaism of the past was utilized to supply Christianity with an unimpeachable history and with a prestige the new church otherwise would not have possessed.[31]
  • Rendering the persistent Jews hateful was done in order to keep the faithful from being attracted to Judaism: the patristic writers employed the words of the Christian scriptures against the Jews and the texts of the Jewish Prophets themselves to falsify the whole of Jewish moral history - announcing that the Jews are, have always been, and will always be evil.[32]
  • Provided a way for the church to explain away the contrary evidence in the emerging history that the kingdom of God had arrived in Christ by making Jews the scapegoat and cause of the continued evil at work.[33] (Interestingly, Muslims were similarly characterized as satanic forces when Islam gained military and political power over Christians.[34])
'Judensau' (folk art image of Jews in obscene contact with a large sow), Minster of Bad Wimpfen

'Judensau' (folk art image of Jews in obscene contact with a large sow), Minster of Bad Wimpfen

The triumphalism of the church went beyond the bounds of religion to influence legislation and became a major preoccupation of Byzantine intellectuals.[35] The anti-Jewish trend of the Byzantine legislation is an echo of the anti-Jewish thrust of the church: it has no independent source.[36] The Church Fathers used a process called value-inversion to destroy Judaism’s historical and biblical credibility by attacking the traits and ideas most identified as Jewish (covenant, monotheism, synagogue, kosher rules, circumcision, Promised Land, Jerusalem and temple).[37] Eusebius of Caesarea juxtaposed the political and religious destinies of both Christians and Jews. Augustine of Hippo argued that this would be the situation to the end of the age.[38] He wrote that the Jews no longer bore positive witness to their relationship to God’s goodness but were likened to Cain – to serve as a warning of disobedience and deicide.[39] This value-inversion in the re-interpretation of history and appropriation of Christian meaning is present in the teachings of Gregory of Nyssa, Hilary of Poitiers, Pseudo-Cyprian, Tertullian and others.[40]

The denigration of the Jews was not limited to written works alone but was preached from the pulpit. Eusebius of Alexandria began every paragraph in the first half of a sermon on the resurrection with a negative statement about the Jews.[41] Jerome linked the Jews with Judas in his preaching.[42] John Chrysostom wrote and spoke in this tumultuous era of changing politics and power struggles both within and without the church. He was perhaps the most bitter of the Church Fathers in regard to the Jews.[43] His polemic was the most violent and tasteless of the anti-Judaic literature within the patristic era.[44] Chrysostom vilified the synagogue, arguing that to go there was no better than visiting a brothel, a robber’s den, or any indecent place.[45] He contributed a profound sense of rage to the anti-Jewish polemic and influenced Emperor Arcadius to issue anti-Jewish edicts.[46] Destructive stereotypes about Jews thus became deeply entrenched in the psyche of the church and had practical consequences for the treatment of Jews.[47]

According to Chesler, ‘At the close of the 3rd Century, the Jew was no more than a special type of unbeliever; by the end of the fourth, the Jew was a semi-satanic figure, cursed by God, marked off by the [Christian] State.’[48] Robert Michael summarises it as follows: ‘It was the Christian Roman emperors who, under the powerful influence of their faith and of the church, were the first whose Jewish policy was based on discrimination, that is, that Jews deserved less protection under the law than Christians.’[49] Post-Chrysostom there was a hardening of attitudes toward the Jews, especially in the late Medieval period.

The stereotype of Jews as Christ-killers and as a despised, subservient, sub-human people beyond hope of atonement took root in ordinary Christian people. Jews were accused of murdering Christian children to incorporate their blood into unleavened bread for Passover,[50] of blaspheming the Christian faith in their sacred literature[51] and for causing the Black Death (plague) that swept across Europe.[52] Manifold ways were sought to exploit the social inferiority of the Jews, to which the teaching of the church pointed.[53] The Inquisition sought to purge the Roman Catholic church of heretics, especially conversos who were suspected of still practicing Jewish customs.[54] Even Humanism fared little better. Renaissance humanist, Erasmus, wrote to an Inquisitor, ‘If it is Christian to hate the Jews, here we are all Christians in profusion.’[55]

“the Martyrdom of St. Simon of Trento for Jewish ritual murder” by contemporary artist Giovanni Gasparro

“the Martyrdom of St. Simon of Trento for Jewish ritual murder” by contemporary artist Giovanni Gasparro

Missed Opportunities, Tragic Consequences

It would be convenient for my Protestant theology if antisemitic attitudes could only be linked to the Church of Rome. But the Reformation did little to improve Jewish-Christian relationships. The antisemitic diatribes of Martin Luther are notorious. Luther viewed it as a pastor’s duty to warn his flock against the Jews and to urge the secular rulers to take appropriate action.[56The appropriate action was, inter alia, that synagogues be burnt to the ground and if anything survived, that it was to buried so that no trace remained; that the houses of Jews be destroyed, because of the significance of the home in their religion; that Jewish prayer books and Talmud be confiscated; that Jews be denied the right to travel on the highways of the Empire; and finally, that all able-bodied Jews be required to undertake hard manual labour.[57] he proposed one of the most extensive and humiliating of anti-Jewish measures ever suggested up until that time.[58] But Luther was not alone in his Reformation thinking towards the Jews. He had a notable parallel in the more moderate Martin Bucer who only wanted no new synagogues to be built, but his underlying rationale was the same.[59] There were others who sought a more positive perspective of the Jewish question, such as Justus Jonas and Andreas Osiander, but given the antisemitic cultural climate of the day, Osainder’s work had to be published anonymously.[60]

Anti-Jewish agitation did not diminish after the Reformation, which reflects the weakness of Protestant theology in this regard. Roland de Corneille sums up the missed opportunities and tragic consequences thus: “Any opportunity which Protestantism had to rectify the past, or at least to establish a segment of the Church on a new footing, was lost. This widespread failure to seize the second chance that history offered contributed, in a very real sense, to the church’s inability in Germany under Hitler to stir from its dumb silence”.[61]

Th Anglican Church is not excluded from this charge of failing to seize the second chance. Jews first settled in England in the eleventh century at the time of the Norman conquest, were later expelled and then invited back under various rulers but faced several challenges to gain equal citizenship. A Naturalization Bill was submitted to parliament in 1753 to enable Jews to acquire land. It was initially adopted in both the House of Lords and the Commons but six months later was repealed.[62] Cohn-Sherbok remarks that: “In this rejection of Jewish emancipation, the dark forces of traditional Christian prejudice against the Jews came to the surface: medieval conceptions of the demonic Jew polluting Christian society thwarted all efforts to grant the Jewish people the full rights of man.[63]

Jews were prevented from being admitted to the English parliament until the mid-nineteenth century. Between 1830 and 1858 fourteen separate attempts were made to remove this legal disability against Jews.[64]The House of Lords dismissed twelve of the proposed Jewish Relief Bills, the most important influence on the voting being Anglican episcopal opposition with the debate being dominated by speeches from bishops and archbishops.[65] Institutional and theological evidence of deep-seated antisemitism within Anglicanism therefore tends only be revealed in topical responses to issues such as the Jewish Relief Bill and in our time, the ACSA support of BDS in relation to Israel-Palestine.

Conclusion

There is a convergence of views in the Anglican Church that delegitimizes the Jewish claim to their historic homeland. Evangelical theology and liberation theology, conservative voices and liberal voices, that have usually countered each other, are speaking the same message: the land of the bible is not the land of the modern state of Israel. Liberation theologians advance the narrative that ‘Jesus is a Palestinian’ and that the earliest Christian believers were Palestinians, reinforcing the notion that modern Jews are not the indigenous people. The term Palestine is used in clergy sermons and writings so as not to give legitimacy to the current state of Israel. Evangelical theologians have arrived at the same conclusion via a different route. John Stott, a prominent and influential Anglican evangelical, is on record as saying: “Is the setting up of the State of Israel a fulfillment of prophecy? It is a reasonable view to hold, and many do hold it, and we regard them with respect and love. Others, among whom I number myself, do not hold that view. There is risk of ignoring the justice of the Palestinians’ cause…”[66]

Peter Walker says, “The land, however important as a theme within previous biblical faith, has now been caught up into a new understanding. It is given a quite new meaning, one that fulfils and yet eclipses its former role within God’s purposes”[67] and further that “The New Testament blessings, which are found now ‘in Christ’ and not ‘in the land’, must be presented to all those in the Holy Land”.[68] Colin Chapman argues that ‘There is no suggestion that the apostles believed that the Jewish people still had a divine right to the land, or that Jewish possession of the land would be an important part of God’s plan for the world.’[69] He goes even further to say, “Jerusalem has lost the centrality that it once had and that Jesus has replaced Jerusalem as the centre of the Jewish faith”.[70] Palmer Robertson applies the same thinking to Jerusalem: “By the conclusion of the apostolic era, the focal point of the redemptive working of God in the world had shifted dramatically from Jerusalem to places like Antioch, Galatia and Ephesus…The Jews were inhabiting Jerusalem, but obviously it was no longer the ‘city of God’ as it had been under the typological administration of the old covenant”.[71] A final voice saying the same thing, Naim Ateek comments, “So in the light of their universal fulfilment in Christ, the narrow Old Testament promises regarding the land have acquired a new meaning. They are now seen to be transitory and provisional in their intention. They are time-bound, and because of their completion in Christ, have become theologically obsolete”.[72] Therefore, Ateek argues, contrary to Judaism, Jesus has offered an inclusive message to counter the exclusive, primitive and discriminatory claims of the Old Testament.[73]

While none of these voices are South African, our context only acts to amplify the theological trends that denigrate and invalidate Judaism and by extension, the Jews themselves. The theological delegitimizing of the Jewish claim to their historic homeland of Israel feeds into the same political aims of the BDS. Wherever the BDS movement has gained traction in South Africa, and as Israel Apartheid Weeks have grown on university campuses, so antisemitism has been exposed.[74] The apartheid struggle song, ‘Shoot the Boer’ on at least one occasion was reworded and sung as ‘Shoot the Jew.’ [75] Students from the African National Congress (ANC)-affiliated Congress of South African Students (COSAS) put a pig’s head in the meat section of Woolworths, targeting South African Jewry.[76] Tony Ehrenreich, Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) Western Cape Provincial Secretary and an ANC leader posted on his Facebook page, “The time has come to say very clearly that if a woman or child is killed in Gaza, then the Jewish board of deputies, who are complicit, will feel the wrath of the People of SA with the age old biblical teaching of an eye for an eye”.[77]

This is why there is not equivalency between Islamophobia and antisemitism in South Africa. The Church Fathers used value-inversion to destroy Judaism’s historical and biblical credibility in Christian eyes by attacking the ideas central to Judaism. The contemporary church mothers and fathers, preachers and theologians, continue in the same vein. This denigration of Judaism is not only found in the resolutions of modern Anglican Church hierarchies but is reinforced by sermons from the pulpit.

This becomes profoundly problematic with a population that is largely Christianized and one that wants to rally against anyone identified with being a proponent of apartheid. Notwithstanding whether it is justified or not, Jews can be vilified as former white apartheid oppressors who are still unrepentantly supporting the white settler invasion of Palestine. This can happen despite what David Saks has noted, that a startlingly disproportionate number of Jewish community members played a role in the anti-apartheid movement.[78] On the other hand, Muslims in South Africa, like the Jews, are also a minority but are identified with being on the right side of the apartheid struggle both in terms of historic South African apartheid and contemporary Israeli apartheid narratives.

The results of a survey on antisemitism conducted by the Anti Defamation League (ADL) in late 2019 ranked South Africa as second only to Poland, but the South African Jewish Board of Deputies and the Kaplan Centre in Cape Town were quick to disparage the ADL’s methodology, accusing it of Eurocentrism.[79] Yet, the findings of the ADL survey are consistent with a survey conducted by the South African Human Sciences Research Council in 1994 which showed that nearly one in three respondents considered the Jewish community to be ‘mostly a liability’ and a Pew Global Attitudes Survey in 2008 that found two-thirds of South Africans disliked Jews in the extreme.[80] Milton Shain argues not to discount these underlying attitudes in South Africa because, under specific conditions, antisemitic attitudes can turn into actions.[81] Firestone notes the same concern that antisemitism and Islamophobia remain in latent forms until triggered by economic, political or social stress.[82]

The national COVID lockdown resulting in the closure of businesses, loss of employment and the several years forecast for an economic recovery is providing major stressors on all levels - social, political and economic. The convergence of these dynamics should raise a warning flag regarding antisemitism. Therefore, even if contemporary Islamophobia and antisemitism are two sides of the same coin, if that coin is flipped in the South African context, thanks to the religious weighting of the church and political weighting of the apartheid narrative, it will in all probability land facedown to the detriment of the Jews. My apologies for being pessimistic, but history has not been kind on this score.

REFERENCES

1 Report on the Inquiry into a Working Definition of Islamophobia / anti-Muslim Hatred, The All Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims (December 2018), 21.

2 Klug, B, ‘The Limits of Analogy: Comparing Islamophobia and Antisemitism’, Patterns of Prejudice, Vol. 48 (5), 2014, 452.

3 UN Human Rights Council Document No. A/HRC/6/6, 21 (August 2007), http://www.oicun.org/uploads/f... (Accessed 7 April 2020).

4 Report on the Inquiry into a Working Definition of Islamophobia, 21-32.

5 Ibid, 42.

6 Firestone, R., ‘Islamophobia and Antisemitism: History and Possibility,’ Arches Quarterly, Vol.4, Ed. 7, (Winter 2010), 5.

7 International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Plenary, Budapest (2015), https://www.holocaustremembran... (Accessed 7 April 2020).

8 Jankie, M., Provincial Synod votes on Israel sanctions, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, 26 September 2019, https://anglicanchurchsa.org/p... (Accessed 7 April 2020).

9 BDS South Africa, Press Statement: Anglican Church in Southern Africa Adopts BDS Boycott of Israel, 29 September 2019, http://www.bdssouthafrica.com/... (Accessed 7 April 2020).

10 Feinberg, T., ‘Chief Rabbi Slams Anglican Church’s Support for BDS’, South African Jewish Report (10 October 2019), https://www.sajr.co.za/sa/feat... (Accessed 7 April 2020).

11 Heschel, A. J., The Insecurity of Freedom: Essays on Human Existence, (Schocken Books, 1972) 169.

12 Ibid, The Insecurity of Freedom, 169.

13 Wilson, M.R., Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith, (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1989), 91.

14 Ibid.

15 Ibid.

16 Ibid

17 Ibid, 92.

18 Skarsaune, O., In the Shadow of the Temple, (InterVarsity Press, 2002), 262.

19 Skarsaune, In the Shadow of the Temple, 262.

20 Wilson, Our Father Abraham, 92.

21 Skarsaune, In the Shadow of the Temple, 266.

22 Banki, J.H., ‘What and How Jews Teach about Evangelicals and Christianity’, in Rudin, A.J. & Wilson, M.R. (Eds), A Time to Speak, (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1987), 94.

23 Ibid

24 Heschel, The Insecurity of Freedom, 169

25 Perry, M. & Schweitzer, F., Jewish-Christian Encounters Over the Centuries, (Peter Lang Publishers, 1994), iv.

26 Keith, G., Hated Without a Cause? A Survey of Anti-Semitism, (Paternoster Press, 1997), 93.

27 Heschel, The Insecurity of Freedom, 170.

28 Keith, Hated Without a Cause? 94.

29 Ibid, 95.

30 Ibid

31 Michael, R. ‘Antisemitism and the Church Fathers’ in Perry & Schweitzer, Jewish Christian Encounters over the Centuries, 106.

32 Ibid.

33 Ibid, 107.

34 Firestone, ‘Islamophobia and Antisemitism: History and Possibility,’ 9.

35 Langer, N.R.M. ‘Jews and Christian in the Byzantine Empire’, in Wood, D., (Ed), Christianity and Judaism, Studies in Church History, Vol 29 (1992), 26.

36 Langer, ‘Jews and Christian in the Byzantine Empire’, 22.

37 Michael, ‘Antisemitism and the Church Fathers’, 108

38 Michael, ‘Antisemitism and the Church Fathers’, 99.

39 Ibid, 108.

40 Ibid, 109-110.

41 Ibid, 110.

42 Ibid, 112.

43 Ibid, 113.

44 Keith, Hated Without a Cause? 108

45 Cohn-Sherbok, D. (1992) The Crucified Jew: Twenty Centuries of Christian Anti-Semitism, (Harper Collins Publishers, 1992), 33.

46 Michael, ‘Antisemitism and the Church Fathers’, 115.

47 Langer, ‘Jews and Christian in the Byzantine Empire’, 26.

48 Chesler, P., The New Anti-Semitism, (Jossey-Bass, 2003), 32.

49 Michael, ‘Antisemitism and the Church Fathers’, 116.

50 Cohn-Sherbok, The Crucified Jew, 38.

51 Ibid

52 Ibid, 49

53 Keith, Hated Without a Cause? 147.

54 Cohn-Sherbok, The Crucified Jew, 84.

55 Keith, Hated Without a Cause? 148.

56 Bainton, R., Here I Stand, (Lion Publishing, 1978), 162.

57 Cohn-Sherbok, The Crucified Jew, 73.

58 Keith, Hated Without a Cause? 169.

59 Ibid, 176.

60 Ibid, 177.

61 De Corneille, R, Christians and Jews: The Tragic Past and the Hopeful Future, Harper and Row, 1966, 35

62 Cohn-Sherbok, The Crucified Jew, 119.

63 Ibid

64 Knight, F., ‘The Bishops and the Jews 1828-1858’ in Wood, D., (Ed), Christianity and Judaism, Studies in Church History, Vol 29 (1992), 387.

65 Knight, ‘The Bishops and the Jews 1828-1858’, 388. (Somewhat ironically, given that his father championed the emancipation of slaves, Samuel Wilberforce, Bishop of Oxford, is noted as being the most hostile of the anti-Jewish emancipationist bishops during this period.)

66 Stott, J, Foreword, in Johnston, P. & Walker, P. (Eds), The Land of Promise (Intervarsity Press: Illinois, 2000), 11.

67 Walker, P, ‘The Land in the Apostles’ Writings’ in Johnston & Walker, The Land of Promise, 91.

68 Walker, P, ‘The Land and Jesus Himself’ in Johnston & Walker, The Land of Promise, 119.

69 Chapman, C, ‘Ten Questions for a Theology of the Land’ in Johnston & Walker, The Land of Promise, 180.

70 Chapman, C, Whose Holy City? Jerusalem and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Lion Hudson plc, 2004, 48

71 Robertson, P.O., ‘The Land in Christian Theology,’ in Johnston & Walker, The Land of Promise, 138.

72 Ateek, N., ‘Zionism and the Land: A Palestinian Christian Perspective’ in Johnston & Walker, The Land of Promise, 206.

73 Munayer, S.J., ‘A Palestinian Christian View’ in Munayer, S.J. & Loden., L, Through My Enemy’s Eyes, (Paternoster Press, 1988), 156.

74 Chernick, I, ‘South African University Plagued with Antisemitism during Apartheid Week’, The Jerusalem Post, (10 March 2017), https://www.jpost.com/diaspora... (Accessed 18 April 2020).

75 Hodes, R, ‘Dibul’ ijuda/Shoot the Jew’ and the Local architecture of anti-Semitism’, Daily Maverick Newspaper, (12 September 2013), https://www.dailymaverick.co.z... (Accessed 18 April 2020).

76 Fredericks, I., ‘COSAS Steps up Woolies Pig’s Head Protest’, Independent Online, (5 November 2014), https://www.iol.co.za/news/sou... (Accessed 19 April 2020).

77 ‘Time for an eye-for-an-eye against Zionist aggression - Tony Ehrenreich’, Politics Web, (14 August 2014) https://www.politicsweb.co.za/... (Accessed 19 April 2020)

78 Saks, D., ‘SA Jewry Under Apartheid – A Very Old Debate Revisited’, SAJBD Media, 02 January 2020,

https://www.sajbd.org/media/so...

79 Shain, M., ‘Much a Jew About Nothing’, Politics Web, (12 December 2019), https://www.politicsweb.co.za/... (Accessed 18 April 2020).

80 Ibid

81 Ibid

82 Firestone, ‘Islamophobia and Antisemitism: History and Possibility,’ 10.


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On Saturday night Iran launched hundreds of missiles against civilian and religious targets in a grotesque act of war against Israel. In an unprecedented act of solidarity, Arab states, the USA, Britain and France stood up against this attack on the Jewish state, and the attack failed to achieve its aim of death and destruction on all who live in Israel.

The SAJBD calls for the reinstatement of Dr Bridget Farham

The SAJBD calls for the reinstatement of Dr Bridget Farham
as editor of the SAMJ

The South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) calls for the immediate reinstatement of Dr Bridget Farham as editor of the South African Medical Journal, following her ousting by the South African Medical Association (SAMA).