THE CHURCH AND THE ISRAEL OF GOD. INTRODUCTION.

 

   This is a survey of the comments written over the past two millennia in which antipathy has been expressed against the Jewish people. It is a simple register of of the teachings, theories, polemics, doctrines and superstitions which constitute the written evidence of the longest and most enduring hatred in human history.scholars

It is offered with minimum of comment,analysis, interpretation or censure: such deductions are the prerogative of the professional,-which I am not. A simple presentation of the evidence is the best ground for any unprejudiced judgement in a matter which has long been omitted from many general histories of Europe and its churches. Emotive or subjective comment has been avoided,-difficult as this has been. The intention is to allow the summaries or digests to speak for themselves about the authors’ intentions or motives.

A paper trail has been laid over nearly two milllennia which reflected the general opprobrium and contempt for Jews arising from faulty religious inferences, unfounded superstitions and cultural and social distinctions which underwent a metamorphosis in the last two centuries to emerge as a racial hatred. The writers who recorded their animus towards the Jews were secular and religious scholars, poets and philosophers. They wrote often haphazardly and without any foreknowledge of the final import which their writings would leave as a legacy for future generations. The residuary legatees of this age-old animosity are now holding court in the terror groupings scattered around the world , and in covert cliques lurking on the fringes of Western –style  democratic societies.

   Any reader will quickly realize that this collection of “digests” and quotations is blatantly tendentious and also a prosecution.=.- it is both  ! The whole of European society, at this present time and throughout history, has a charge to answer before God and before the Jewish people. The reader can survey these written evidences of an unfounded a

and shameful hatred according to their own unclouded conscience.

 

 

    Most of European society, including its churches, will disclaim any responsibilityfor the anti-Jewish writers of earlier generations, and will plead that had they lived during those past ages they would never have been guilty of such prejudice and enmity in word ordeed. Such an excuse is strangely reminiscent of the attitude of the Pharisees on the occasion when Jesus had cause to rebuke them, as recorded in the gospel of Matthew,ch.23,v.30-31 :-“If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets. So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets.”

    Europeans in the 21st.century are the descendants of the Jew-baiters and writers who berated them in past generations. We Europeans are now identified  with our cultural inheritance,- with all the good that has been generated by a “Christianised “society , and with all the wrongs that have been perpetrated . Our human oneness in European society binds us all in responsibility for its past misdeeds, while it also makes us inheritors of its benefits.                   i

    ( to be continued…)       .

THE CHURCH AND THE ISRAEL OF GOD.

  “ COMFORT,  MY  PEOPLE.”

An overview of anti-Jewish sentiments through the ages, and a call to the churches to comfort His people Israel.

“Comfort, comfort My people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has  been paid for, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sin.”- Isaiah ch.40,v.1-2.

 

( Hopefully, I will try to issue an “Introduction “ to this theme.)

PRE-CHRSTIAN AND OTHER ANCIENT AUTHORS.- A DIGEST –contd…

ALEXANDER  POLYHISTOR,-1st.century B.C.. Following a myth derived from the Jewish Sibyl, it was said that the Jewish law was a produced by a woman named Moso.

TIMAGENES OF ALEXANDRIA ,1st. century,B.C. He alleged that the Jews appropriated land belonging to others and then tried to impose their customs on them.

PTOLEMY, 1st.century, B.C. He claimed that the Jews conquered the Idumeans, and imposed on them taxes, the rite of circumcision and their own laws.

QUINTILIAN,1st. century,B.C. He wrote that the Jews are hated and a curse to others living near them.

STRABO, 1st.century,B.C. He considered that the Jewish leaders perverted the pantheistic religion of Moses, and created Judaism instead.

PETRONIUS,1st. century,A.D   The Jews deserve scorn because of the rite of circumcision.

SENECA,1st. century, A.D. He wrote that the Jews are an evil nation, who are colonising the empire and that Judaism is a superstition from the East, because it conflicted with all the philosophical concepts of an abstract religion.

PLINY THE ELDER,1st.century, A.D. He wrote that Judaism was an unnatural religion because of its hatred of the gods.

TACITUS, 56-117,A.D. He saw the Jews as guilty of misanthropy, separatism and the use of  strange foods.

JUVENAL, 1st. and 2nd. century..The Jews are guilty of flouting Roman laws, misanthropy, separatism and the strange rite of circumcision.

CICERO, 1st.century,B.C. In his “Pro Flacco” he asserted that the Jewish religion was a superstition, differing from normal Roman beliefs, and the clannish Jews are “born to servitude.”

CHAEREMON OF ALEXANDRIA, 1st.century. He asserted that the Jews were expelled from Egypt because 250,000 were lepers and 380 were shepherds, an abomination in Egypt.

LYSIMACHUS, circa.1st.century,..He repeated the myth of expulsion from Egypt because of leprosy and other afflictions. The leadership of Moses brought about their exclusiveness and contempt for other religions.

DAMOCRITUS, 1st.century..He repeated the myth of Jewish worship of an asses’ head , and the myth of the ritual murder every seventh year of a captured foreigner.

APION.,1st.century.He accused the Jews of a variety of crimes:-sedition in the colony of Alexandria,the worship of an asses’ head,hatred of other races,sacrificing live animals,ritual  murder and the strange custom of circumcision.

VALERIUS MAXIMUS,1st.century.He considered that the Jewish cult was associated with the cult of Jupiter Sabazius.-(  A corruption of the word Sabbath.)

MARTIAL, 1st. century,.He thought that the Jews were especially immoral.

PLUTARCH, 2nd. century. He believed the Jews honour the pig and the ass, and that their god is Bacchus, which is associated with the cult of Dionysus. Their feast of Rosh Hashanah resembles that cults’ practices.

APPIAN, 2nd. century. The Jews deserve the heavy Roman taxation because of their insurrection.

LUCIAN,2nd. century. He thought the Jews were diviners and profited by exploiting superstitious minorities

PHILOSTRATUS, 3rd. century. He alleged that the Jews are exclusive and deserve the sufferings inflicted on them in 70A.D.when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem.

CASSIUS DIO, 2nd.- 3rd.century. The alleged that the Jews were guilty of causing uprisings in Cyrene,Egypt and Cyprus 9115-116 A.D.).They labour under a superstition of their own.

CELSUS,2nd. century.   He wrote his “True Account” in 178.A.D., in which he denounced Judaism and Christianity.His comments can be deduced from Origen’s “Contra Celsum”. He asserted that the O.T. prophecies and miracles are false, and that the Jews are a proud, hateful, misanthropic people, who worship angels and practice witchcraft.They were expelled from Egypt because of sedition.

PRE-CHRISTIAN AND OTHER ANCIENT AUTHORS…A DIGEST.

Hostility towards the Jews in the ancient Greco-Latin world was generally a literary device or an affectation, prompted by Judaism’s high monotheism, its cultural separation from other people groups,its prophetic traditions and heritage,-an unknown phenomenon at the time,-and its strong sense of divine election.

The pagan perception of Judaism was that this distinctive religion was an atheistic superstition because of its rejection of images and idols. The Jews’ exclusivity was thought to be an evidence of misanthropy, especially as many Jews dissociated themselves from the emerging Christian church .

The Jews were  a small, indefensible target for literary and unjustified abuse.

 

MANETHEO..3rd. century.  The Jews are descendants of the Hyksos , a despised ,leprous people, driven out of Egypt with their leader ,-Osarsiph (Moses). They scorned the gods of Egypt and its sacred beasts ad customs.

HECATAEUS OF ABDERA..3rd. century B,C.  The Jews study the stars, and are race who hate others and are totally unsociable.

THEOPHRASTUS..3rd. century, B.C.  The Jews call on their god,but also worship the stars and animals, and engage in human sacrifice.

AGATHARCHIDES OF CNIDUS..2nd. century, B.C.  Jewish religious customs, such as circumcision and sabbath observance  are ridiculous

MNASEAS OF PATRAS,,2nd.century, B.C. He alleged that the Jews worship a donkey’s head, a myth developed from the report  that a golden head of a donkey was found in their temple.

POSEIDONIUS OF APAMEIA, 2nd.century,B.C. The Jews are said to hate all other races. They were expelled from Egypt because of their leprosy and their hatred of the Egyptian gods.Their exclusiveness is evident in their religious laws, which conflict with humanity and justice. Antiochus punished them by desecrating their temple in 169.B.C.

APOLLONIUS  MOLON..1st,century,B.C. The Jews are thought to hate all foreigners, as well as being superstitious, atheists, exclusive,immoral and blots in human society.

        TO BE CONTINUED…

A PREFACE.

This survey of anti-Jewish writings, collected by a layman,- myself, has material which is well-known to most professional historians and other academics. The notes or “digests” which follow have been assembled on the backs of giants,- eminent historians and research scholars, whose labours are acknowledged in the bibliography. The quotations which form the background to these digests have been removed in order to create a more condensed blog, and also to avoid the tedious,vexatious and costly process of obtaining copyright permissions from many publishers and authors.

This is a primitive survey and I have ignored the normal apparatus of a professional piece of work, which would comprise references, footnotes,an index and the use of foreign terminology.