ANTI - SEMITISM.
The first record is in Egypt. The Egyptians forgot that Joseph's God had saved the nation from famine. They made slaves of the people who had once saved them from death. There is a parallel between the slavery in Egypt and Hitler's labour camps. It is more than xenophobia - the fear of strangers. Israel rejected the concept of polytheism and introduced the World to Monotheism. Implicitly they denied the basis to the belief of the Egyptians. When Moses came to deliver them he had clearly rejected the life-style and polytheistic world of Egypt. There was a spiritual battle, which was taking place in Heaven and was acted out on Earth.
Thereafter there was a series of rejections by the peoples with whom Israel came into contact. First the Amalakites would not help them although they knew their plight. Then came the Edomites – the descendents of Esau - who were closely related to them. When they came to the Promised Land the peoples there knew all about the slavery in Egypt and their deliverance. Joshua ch 2. Rahab said that they had heard all about them and their God. There was plenty room to accommodate them but the other peoples ganged up against them and threatened anyone who was inclined to support them. Joshua ch 9 v 1. Peoples who were at war with one another were united in their opposition to Israel. They brought a God with them who denounced their false gods and disgusting practices. They had two choices: either they could bow the knee to the real God or they had to get rid of them and their God.
Just as Israel struggled with God in their own life so they struggled with the enemies of God around them. Later, when large numbers lived in Persia after the days of captivity in Babylon, the same situation arose. In the story of Esther there is recounted the confrontation between Haman and Mordecai. Haman was an Amalakite - an enemy of Israel. He was so incensed at Mordecai's rejection of him and was reminded of Mordecai's God that he planned the final solution to the problem - the total extermination of all the Jews in the Empire. This would have been almost the entire Jewish population in the World at that time, such was the extent of the Persian Empire.
When the Israelites returned to the Land, the peoples there again resisted the rebuilding of the walls and the resettlement. Sanballat and Tobiah led the opposition.
Within three years of Emperor Constantine becoming a Christian, Rome persecuted the Jews. Before then Judaism had been allowed by the Empire as a legitimate religion. The Romans were in favour of religion as long as it did not pose a threat to the Empire. Christianity challenged the authority of the Emperor and as a result the Christians were persecuted. The unconverted Jews sided with the Romans. Then when Constantine professed being a Christian the situation was reversed and the Christians took their revenge. They ought not to have done so but sin gave vent to the natural human desire to hit back at the oppressors. It was the Christian Church who introduced the yellow arm-band to be worn by Jews. All the anti-Jewish ideas of Hitler, apart from the gas chambers, were put in hand by the Church - in the name of Jesus.
Britain expelled all its Jews in 1100 A. D. after a massacre at York. Scotland is one of the few countries not to have persecuted the Jews. Later Oliver Cromwell invited them to come back. The Crusades led to the wholesale slaughter of Jews. The Crusaders set off to liberate Palestine from the Muslims yet Jews were killed in large numbers all the way along the route. Spain and Portugal killed many Jews during the Spanish Inquisition. Just after that Jews emigrated to America, where they have had a haven until today. Persecution in Russia has been particularly bad. Since Communism is State atheism it stands to reason that the Jews who remind the World of Monotheism are a challenge to the basis of the State. Again they have been kept in bondage and treated as second-class citizens, being denied certain rights.
In Islam the Jews and Christians are treated as dhimi people. This amounts to second-class citizenship with restricted rights and they have been kept in subjection to Muslims. In fact the Jews have been treated better by Muslims than by the Church. Many of the Christian Fathers were very anti-semitic. Gregory was especially hostile. Martin Luther was also hostile to the Jewish people. The Eastern Orthodox Church even today still preaches against the Jews portraying them as the killers of Jesus.
It has been an axiom of Zionism that a state must come into existence where Jews could feel safe. This meant that they must be in control. Power sharing does not meet this objective. Also all Jews should be free to return to the national home. In the early days it was not envisaged that so many would return as to upset the balance with the Arab population. David Ben Gurion had three objectives: 1. Jews ought to return to the Land. 2. The new community ought to be socialist. 3. The Hebrew language ought to be used.
Jewish fears of the Soviets were well founded. In August 1919 all Jewish religious communities were dissolved, their property confiscated and the overwhelming majority of synagogues closed. Stalin was deeply anti-semitic.
Some suggest that the New Testament is anti-Jewish. The term "Pharisee" is equated with a bad person. But not all Pharisees were hostile. Some were good moral people. Matthew is simply stressing the negative relationship and so gives the wrong impression. This was a family row between Jews. People say some hard things in the family, which they would not say outside. Much is said out of frustration. John uses the term "Jews" as a shorthand term for those Jews who were against Jesus. Many Jews were for Him. It is the language of hyperbole. The word "Old" suggests in many cultures “redundant.” Some Churches almost ignore the Old Testament, as if it related to the Jews and now the Church should have nothing to do with them. Many Church leaders have taught that the Church is the new Israel. The Jews were relegated to failures and the Church is all that matters. It was not the Jews who killed Jesus. All men all guilty of His death. It was the sins of mankind that drove Jesus to the Cross. He laid His life down of His own accord for all men.
The Holocaust. Germany was by far the World's best-educated nation between 1933 and 1945. It was a highly educated civilisation, which turned against the Jews. The Jews and the Germans shared an almost fanatical devotion to learning. For the Jews, Germany was the best place to work in. This explains why there were so many Jews in Germany. Pre-war Germany was the most law-abiding country in Europe but the First World War changed all that. It accustomed men to violence. As soon as Hitler consolidated his personal and party dictatorship a systematic attack on the Jews was inevitable. He said that he would hang all the Jews till they stink - and then hang another one. He had a dual strategy: spontaneous violence and systematic violence of the State. During his 12 years the Jews were the victims of sudden attacks and organised state cruelty. He had learned that open, widespread physical violence against the Jews as a whole was not acceptable to the German people in peacetime. War brought its own exigencies and drew a veil over many activities. Hitler willed the war to destroy the Jews - and that included all European Jews. In the Labour Camps and in industry Jews were being worked to death. One spontaneous act of violence saw the SS hold a whipping orgy when in 1940 1600 Jews were flogged throughout the night. Hitler regarded war as a licence for genocide and he set the scientific process in motion the very day war broke out. Overall it is estimated that the Nazis killed 5,933,900 or 67% of Jews under their control. 90 % of Polish Jews were killed.
Anti-semitism had deep roots in France. The German people knew about and acquiesced in the genocide. There were 900,000 in the SS. The Austrians were even worse and there was a similar approach in Rumania where 757,000 Jews were among the worst-treated in Europe. Roosevelt was anti-semitic and America and Britain knew what was happening in Germany, as did the Red Cross. They decided that if they spoke out Germany would invade Switzerland and so they remained silent.
The Jews did not produce a resistance movement. They had been persecuted for 2000 years and knew that resistance cost more lives. Their theology taught them not to fight. The most ambitious had emigrated and the most energetic had gone to Palestine. When war broke out Menachem Begin was escorting a group of illegal immigrants across Rumania to Palestine. They just could not conceive of the monster devised by Hitler. The Germans lied at every stage of the process. They clung to the hope that only a few would die. As a rule there was no resistance at all at any stage of the extermination process. There were spontaneous acts of unspeakable cruelty and Jews died in every kind of way known to depraved humanity. The deaths carried on even when it was clear that Germany had lost the war. Two thousand years of anti-semitism had found its climax in Hitler's plans. In 1942 the Grand Mufti in Jerusalem protested that Jews should be sent back to Poland. The centre of Anti-semitism was transferred to the Middle East. Even after the war there were 350 cases of murder in Poland. The Arab States blocked compensation, which Germany had agreed to pay. Pope Pius X11 failed to condemn the Final Solution of the Jews by Hitler.
The overwhelming lesson the Jews learned from the Holocaust was the imperative need to secure for themselves a permanent secure homeland where if necessary the entire World Jewry could find safety from their enemies. The First World War made Zionism possible. The Second World War made it essential.
Pressure on Israel has been constant since the Jews established the State of Israel in 1948. They remind the World of the grace of God. This offends man's pride and exposes the false gods. The real struggle in the Middle East is not about race, territory, economics or nationalities. It is a spiritual struggle between the forces of light and the forces of darkness. Behind Islam is a principality. The whole theology of Islam is undermined by the presence of a Jewish state. Islam teaches that it is the final revelation of God to the World. God has finished with the Jews and the Christians. For there to be a Jewish state right in the middle of Islamic land undermines all that Islam stands for. Either the Bible or the Koran is right. Ever since the state of Israel has been established there has been a relentless and continuous attempt by the forces of Islam to exterminate the state of Israel. In six major wars Islam has failed.
To follow God seems to involve suffering, since the rejection of God finds its expression in opposition to those who remind the World of God. Jesus suffered in every imaginable way. The Jews remind mankind that man can only live by grace. The Church is slow to condemn anti-semitism. The Jews who survived the Holocaust were spared from Hitler by grace. Man does not like that. He trusts in materialism and likes to be his own god. The Jews remind man that without God he is nothing. Material developments came in Europe through Jewish and Christian culture. It did not come in Africa or Asia. The Gentile World is angry and jealous. The atheists in France treated the Jews better than the Church. Man needs to unlearn his prejudicies.
The destruction of Israel is threatened today from every direction. The Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party declare their hatred of the Jewish People and Israel. Satan knows that if he can successfully destroy Israel and the Jewish people he can invalidate God's programme of redemption. God's Word is clear: destroy the Jew and you destroy the Bible. 2 Sam ch 7 v 24 says that God has chosen the people Israel to be a people unto Him forever. His Word is unequivocably linked with the nation of Israel. Jer ch 31 v 35-7 confirms this. The wives of the Patriarchs were barren. It was only by divine intervention that the seed line of the Messiah was preserved.
No other people in all history have suffered like the Jews. Repeatedly they have been brought to the verge of annihilation. Pharaoh, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Christian Church through the Crusades etc, Hitler and now Islam. There is a sustained Satanically-inspired hatred seeking their destruction. Yet in fulfilment of God's prophetic Word the nation exists today. The dry bones were resurrected from the graves of the nations. Ezekiel ch 37.
Paralleling the rise of Israel has been the increase in the proliferation and destructive capability of nuclear warfare. Several nations can destroy the World. Within the next few years more nations will have that capability, including Iran. The super powers with the knowledge explosion in the area of science and technology entered into both a space race and a geophysical exploration of the Earth to measure the Universe above and the Earth beneath. Satan is attempting to deceive man into thinking that he can explain away God and live a life independent of Him. In the final days Satan will turn his wrath upon Israel in a final attempt to invalidate the Word of God by destroying the nation of Israel. Rev ch 12 v 13-7. Yet the Jew is lost without the Gospel. Satan is racing to destroy them before the Messiah returns, just as he seeks to persuade the Christians to ignore their spiritual needs. The New Age Movement, while tolerant of all religions, is hostile to the Jews and fundamental Christians. Tolerance is approved by them while intransigence is not acceptable.
To the nations it needs to be said by believers: "These are God's People and we stand with them." To the Jew it needs to be said: "This is your Messiah. We serve Him. Come and serve Him with us." Believers dare do no less.
The Arabs have twisted the Word of God yet blame the Jews for that very error. Man always sees the faults in others which he has in himself.
1. It has been constant ever since Israel moved into the land. Other nations are offended by her presence. Yet the Jews always had a love for the land. It is the only place where they have felt at home and acceptable.
2. The first record is in Egypt. The Egyptians made slaves of the people.
3. Next came the Amalekites and then the Edomites.(Obadiah) Then the peoples of Canaan.
4. Persia. The story of Esther. Haman sought the extinction of the Israelites.
5. When they returned they were met by resistance from Sandballot and Tobiah. (Ezra)
6. The Emperor Constantine claimed to have becume a Christian and the Church took revenge on the Jews. The Church started the persecution under Constantine. Yellow badges and the burning of synagogues was the order of the day.
7. Britain expelled all Jews in 1100.A.D. after a massacre at York.
8. The Crusaders killed Jews, although they were sent to free Palestine and kill Muslims.
9. The Spanish Inquisition.
10. Persecution in Russia. Stalin was deeply anti-semitic.
11. Zionism. A longing for a land where the Jews could feel safe.
12. Is the New Testament anti- Jewish? Many Churches ignore the Old Testament. Others teach that the Church is the new Israel.
13. The Holocaust. How could it have happened that 5,933,900 Jews were killed?
14. Germany was not alone. Austria, Rumania and the Red Cross all played their part.
15. The Middle East took over the leading role from Germany in 1942.
16. Since the State of Israel was formed on 14th May 1948 there has been unrelenting war waged on Israel by Islam. Israel has survived six major wars when she was totally outnumbered.
17. No other nation has suffered like the people of Israel. Yet they exist today by the grace of God.
18. God has said that as long as the Heavens exist Israel will be a nation before Him. Jer ch 31 v 35-37.
19. The story of Israel reminds the World of the true God, as against false gods. Ephraim - my first-born son.
20. The Russian Emperor asked for evidence of God. The Jews remind the World of God.
21. The Jews have brought blessings to the World through many inventions. Jews have received 75 Nobel peace prizes. There is jealousy on the part of the Gentile World.
22. The Jews have been used as scapegoats. Man sees the faults in others, which he has in himself.
23. They have never been allowed to settle or integrate other than in Israel. The hand of God has been on them.
24. The Bible contains 40 chapters about judgement of the nations.
25. “Chosen” has been misinterpreted to be like a teachers pet. There is resentment of the favouritism of God. It is not so. The Jewish people were chosen for a purpose – to reveal God to the World – very hard task.
26. The Jews have much to teach the World about family life and education.
27. They are the only democracy in the Middle East. God always wanted them to be a theocracy.
28. Their restoration of the land is in marked contrast to the way the Arabs treated the land while the Jews were in exile.
29. Replacement theology says that God is finished with the Jewish people.
30. The New Testament is not anti-Jewish. It is a family quarrel. The Gospels are a debate amongst Jews.
31. The Jews are blamed for the death of Jesus. It was the Romans (Gentiles) who actually carried out the crucifixion. Jesus laid His life down of His own accord for all people. Man feels less guilty, if he can blame the Jews.
32. Salvation is of the Jews. Rejection of them is bound up with mankind's rejection of God.
33. The Jews were sinners, but they were less so than the disgusting peoples around them. Transference of guilt.
34. Their history tells of God. Their destiny is in the hands of God. They remind the World of God and of Judgement.
35. Israel is regularly condemned by the United Nations. There was no condemnation of Kuwait when after the Gulf war it expelled 300,000 Palestinians. Hundreds, if not thousands, of Iraqis were incinerated by American bombs as they fled Kuwait in the last days of the Gulf war.
36. In 1993 Arafat had promised Rabin that the clause in the P L O charter calling for Israel’s complete destruction would be dropped but it has never been removed. Article 20 denies that the Jewish people have any legitimate connection to their ancient homeland.
37. In Daniel’s meeting with Gabriel the Persian Empire were agents for mainly political oppression while the Greek Empire was responsible for theological oppression. The Prince of Greece sought to destroy the Jewish faith through the imposition of Greek culture and immoral values. The same demonic principalities are exercising the same oppression over Israel today. Iran threatens extermination and humanism seeks to destroy faith in God by humanistic thought. Iran threatened to cut off economic and military aid to Syria if he continued in peace talks with Israel.
38. The Russians allow and encourage culture and language - except the Hebrew language.
39. Martin Luther is quoted as calling on people to "burn out the Jews". The Jews were forcibly converted. The Church in Germany watched as anti-semitism grew. The Nazis quoted Luther, as head of the Luthern Church, n order to fuel anti-semitism.
40. The final battle of Armageddon prophesied in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39 has still to take place. The drums of war are on the distant horizon. Iran, Sudan and Lybia will be supported by Russia in Satan's final attempt to overthrow the Jewish people on a physical level and drive them off the face of the atlas.