So the Christians are out to get us
But it’s theoretically for the right reasons.
If Armaggedon qualifies as a right reason.
Favorite parts to this little editorial bon mot?
“Our whole purpose is to hasten the End Times,” says Bill McCartney, co-founder of the evangelical group Promise Keepers. He’s doing his part by trying to convert mass numbers of Jews to Christianity as quickly as possible.
If a bloody cataclysm in Israel is all part of a vengeful God’s grand plan, why bother trying to negotiate a peace? Why not welcome a global religious war between Christianity and Islam?
This is my final post on this kind of thing – at least for a little while. I promise.
It’s just absolutely fascinating to me that we, as a people, can occupy so many niches concurrently: unclean, money-laundering, manipulative, Christ/baby-killing, conspiratorial, Hollywood-runnin’, circumcised THINGS – who, just coincidentally, the entire world’s fate happens to hinge upon, if you follow that particular eschatology.
What makes us so special to be the focus of such attention? This ‘Chosen’ thing cuts both ways: ‘God’s favorites’ only extends to following a very litigious, intricate, academic mode of spiritulality, and comporting yourself to a very high code of conduct that many – even the very frum – fall short on. It’s not such a great gig, being this fly. And I have to wonder if all the hatred towards us over the millenia becomes a real matter of Jew-Envy… like we’re the prettiest cheerleader at school who by no fault of her own, is the victim of gossip and kicking… just by merit of an existence that exposes the flaws in everyone around them.
And with that, I promise to stop expressing myself about the whole Jesus for Jews phenomena.
Agreed, the xtians who target Jews for conversion to xtianity are twisted warped scumbuckets who should rot in hell. But our defense against them is having Jews understand/believe/care about Judaism, beiief in the great bagel just won’t cut it.
But far more worisome are the Muslims who target Jews for death, and their leftist antisemitic fellow travelers amongst the intelligencia. In many circles in academia and the media, and among both xtains AND Jews, a belief in the evil of Jews and Israel is de rigeur. Between the Muslims who are trying to murder us, and their leftist supporters, we are in trouble – I’d like to see more postings here about the threat to my physical well being – my religious beliefs I can handle just fine.,
I agree with dirrigible. We may find these people loathsome but religion is a matter of personal choice in this country. The government is certainly not forcing Jews to convert. That Jews do so willingly should be troubling to people, if they are that concerned about the religiosity of Jews.
Dirrigible’s second point is apt as well. It’s actually sort of nuts that Jews on the far left view conservative American Christians as this big of a threat while the people who actually threaten Jewish lives–ideologically and materially–are supported by the far left.
Muslims are not a threat at all. Were the french a “threat” – like a real live apocalyptic threat – to the Germans in WWI? Or the British to the French in 1812?
Ding, ding, ding, ding ding…..and dirigible, wins the prize!!! I reflected on the post for 10 seconds, and thought, “ok, how long will it be till the first apologist for the Jew-hating Christian Right says, ‘yeah, this is bad, but it’s not the real threat that Islamofacism is.’†What’s that you say, you can’t think of a single instance of Islamic anti-Semitism in the history of the United States? And how the Hell does the alleged Muslim threat in any mitigate the anti-Semitism of targeting Jews for conversion; especially given that perhaps the single greatest obsession of the Orthodox is the failure of Reform and Conservative Judaism, to assure the “continuity†of the Jewish people? Well, perhaps it’s because rightwing Jews will always downplay such conduct by as long as their fundamentalist Christian allies support an expansionist settlement policy in Israel, hatred of homosexuals, obsession with abortion, and destruction of the church-state separation in public schools. After all, what’s a little Jew-hatred between close friends?
David, it’s a question of proportion. Some asshole down the street who keeps me out of a local club because I’m Jewish rates a 1 on my personal scale of danger. J4J, who try to steal Jewish souls rates a 6; skinheads a 4; but Muslims who are trying to murder me rate a 10. So do I spend my time and attention on the 1’s or the 10’s.
And if you read the attempted plots, many of those Muslims who have been arrested in America had as their target Jews and our institutions (luckily the FBI moved in before the deeds were completed). And there have been Muslim murders of Jews in America by reason of the victims religion: a few years ago in DC, if you recall, one of the Jewish headquarters (don’t remember which one, it might have been Hillel, or the ADL, not sure) was invaded by Muslims; and here in LA a muslim terrortist murdered a Jew at the El Al desk. So I’m not saying don’t worry about the 1-5’s, but the big ones get my focus.
“And how the Hell does the alleged Muslim threat in any mitigate the anti-Semitism of targeting Jews for conversion.”
David, the threat is not only “alleged”, a global jihad has been declared against “Jews and crusaders” or do you think that is all some kind of boogey-man made up by the right-wing? And as I’m sure you’re aware, plenty of people like myself who are not on the right view the Islamists as the primary threat to the Jewish people globally, including in the U.S. As I wrote above, religion is a personal choice. I’ve commented on other posts that I think conversion is wack. But we need to keep things in perspective here.
dirrigible and EVS1,
I’d really like to believe that your position is a matter of proportion and perspective, and that you don’t intend to diminish the severity of the Christian Right. There are two equally compelling arguments that seem to belie that claim, however. First, neither of you has ever explained why there’s a need to even mention the comparative severity of the Christian and Islamic threats every single time a story addresses an incident of anti-Semitism by the Christian Right. It is as though in response to every story about someone dying of prostate cancer, a board member of the American Lung Cancer Association wrote a letter noting that lung cancer is more of a “real threat†than prostate cancer. That would indeed be relevant if the story was about the relative mortality of the two diseases. In a story focusing on a particular victim of prostate cancer, however, the response is not only irrelevant, but correctly elicits skepticism about the motivation for writing the letter in the first place.
Additionally, you both keep referring to the incidence of a worldwide Muslim threat, while these stories address the incidence of anti-Semitism in the U.S. If you think that’s unimportant, feel free to say so. But the fact of the matter is that in the United States, anything but isolated occurrences of anti-Semitic bigotry or violence on the part of Muslims is virtually non-existent. The long and venerable tradition of Christian Jew-hatred, however, includes lynching, pogroms, Nazi sympathizers, Holocaust deniers, pervasive housing and employment discrimination, quotas for college admissions, signs in hotels saying “No Jews Allowed,†occasional beatings, and run-of-the-mill accusations of Christ Killer. My parents were evicted from the first apartment they occupied after being married, by a landlord who objected to the smell of “Jewish cooking odors,†an eviction that a disgusted judge had no choice but to uphold. It is profoundly insulting to the victims of such U.S. Christian anti-Semitism to dismiss the importance of their experience by comparison to an unrelated Islamic threat from across the globe.
David, times change. You describe as a “long and venerable tradition” of Christian anti-Semitism, and I agree with you. I really do. But I think the world is a different place than the Middle-Ages or even the early twentieth century. Simply stated, I can understand where you’re coming from but think you are looking at the world through a dated lens.
“It is as though in response to every story about someone dying of prostate cancer, a board member of the American Lung Cancer Association wrote a letter noting that lung cancer is more of a “real threat†than prostate cancer. ”
Sorry, I don’t mean to come off that way. The reason I bring these things up–and I think dirrigible as well, although I am only speaking for myself here–is that I can not understand how people are so incredibly freaked out by conservative Christians who are calling people horrible names (like “Christ Killer”) while ignoring a far worse, global, threat to Jews and all non-Islamists. Yes, Islamists, b/c this global jihadist movement at the present time poses a great threat to Muslims (dirrigible may disagree with me on this). After all, Muslims are the people dying in the largest numbers from these fiends.
When I hear Jews on the far left (and I realize you may not consider yourself on the far left) get worked up about conservative Christians today, it reminds of those radical Jews on the Old and New Left who felt that the greatest threat to their freedom and human rights was coming from the U.S. and other liberal capitalist states, not the USSR and totalitarian states. In hindsight, most Jews have realized the error of this sort of thinking. It doesn’t mean we are all right-wing neoconservatives. But it does mean most of us realize who is really trying to eliminate us, as individuals and as a people. Not so with the far left. They continue to play their time-honored role as useful idiots and fellow travellers.
“If you think that’s unimportant, feel free to say so.”
I don’t think anti-Semitism in the U.S. is unimportant and said so on that “Jews are going to die any minute” thread. I said something to the effect of while Jews in the U.S. do not face violence we are subjected to peoples’ prejudices and intollerance. Yes, I was told that Jews killed Jesus when I was a kid and I can’t tell you how many times someone said they “got Jewed” when they got burned. So, yes, I realize there is anti-Semitism in the U.S.
For the record, David, I don’t particularly dig religious conseratives in general–whether my peeps, Hindu, Muslim, Christian or what have you. I’m much more of a classical liberal: free minds, free speech, free markets, love who you want, etc. But, when people get alarmist about their conservative Christian neighbors here in the U.S. I think a sense of proportion is in order.
As you may have guessed, I don’t expect a sense of proportion from the far left at this point. Not from the same far left who make assertions that Zionists = Nazis and Bush = Hitler. In fact, I think the vast majority of anti-Semitism in the United States is emanating from the anti-Zionist left, not conservative Christians.