Another of Michael Hoffman's errors on his description of my beliefs and Ancient Judaism
Mr. Hoffman,It is amazing how many errors of fact that you crammed into one short missive!!You wrote: "He [Grubach] imagines Judaism to be what the mendacious rabbis say it is - a monotheism, Biblically based, free of Gnosticism, Hellenistic paganism and Near Eastern religions. He ascribes all of the latter to Christianity, not Judaism!"Grubach responds. This is false on all accounts. Many rabbis do not claim that Judaism has always been a "monotheism, Biblically based, free of Gnosticism, Hellenistic paganism and Near Eastern religions."For example, go to http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/premo.html These rabbis suggest the following: " Early Hebrew religion was polytheistic; the curious plural form of the name of God, Elohim rather than El, leads them to believe that the original Hebrew religion involved several gods. This plural form, however, can be explained as a "royal" plural. Several other aspects of the account of Hebrew religion in Genesis also imply a polytheistic faith..."They add that "The earliest Hebrew religion was animistic, that is, the Hebrews seemed to worship forces of nature that dwelled in natural objects."Even the Catholic Scholars who created the New American Bible admit that the ancient texts of the Bible suggest polytheistic beliefs. They wrote: "One will also discover, however, more ancient texts of the Bible (eg. Exodus 15:11; 18: 11) where Israel's God is declared superior to the gods of other nations. These texts, then, admit the existence of other gods, who however have no competency over Israel."Directly contradicting what you wrote, I do not believe that Judaism has always been a monotheism.Paul Grubach
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Hoffman <hoffman@revisionisthistory.org>
To: Grub222 <grub222@aol.com>
Sent: Mon, Sep 6, 2010 8:36 pm
Subject: Re: Grubach article: Christianity, Judaism + National Socialism
Paul Grubach's Erroneous View of Christianity, Judaism and and the Old Testament
By Michael Hoffman, Sept. 6, 2010
Paul Grubach's essay "Christianity, Judaism and German National Socialism: Revisionism Confronts the Theology of Susannah Heschel," is wrong on fundamental points and generally an exercise in confusion.
First and foremost among his errors is his identification of the Talmud and Judaism with the Old Testament. This is the rabbinic claim and he accepts it at face value. He imagines Judaism to be what the mendacious rabbis say it is - a monotheism, Biblically based, free of Gnosticism, Hellenistic paganism and Near Eastern religions. He ascribes all of the latter to Christianity, not Judaism!
"Gnosticism, Hellenistic paganism and Near Eastern religions" is a litany which is a good working description of Judaism and a defective and ridiculous caricature of Christianity.
Any paganism Mr. Grubach finds in Christianity is not found in Jesus Christ or the New Testament. These are later corruptions of the church, mostly added under rabbinic influence.
Mr. Grubach claims Christianity came from Judaism but he never defines Judaism. By Judaism does he mean the Old Testament religion of ancient Israel and its prophets? Or by Judaism does he denote the Pharisees and their Mishnah, Talmud and Midrash? In some cases he seems to assert the former. More often he asserts the latter. Judaism supplants and nullifies the Old Testament and represents a radical departure from Scripture and in fact constitutes a new religion.
Jesus Christ was the fulfillment of the Old Testament. He came to fulfill the true, Old Testament law of God, as He Himself said. Judaism arose with the Pharisees, as a subversion of the Old Testament religion, substituting a theology centered on worship of the Judaic male for the worship of Yahweh God.
Mr. Grubach is unaware that the Old Testament, as reflected in the writings of the prophet Isaiah, for example, is anti-Jewish. Isaiah declared that Israel had "unclean lips." The Talmud states that for this supposedly offensive statement, Isaiah the prophet was rightly killed.
In truth, the Old Testament is replete with attacks on Israel and warnings of the terrible fate that awaited these wayward people if they did not reform. National Socialist and neo-pagan nationalist right wing groups have for many decades stubbornly clung to the legend that rabbinic Judaism is the Old Testament religion and that the Old Testament is a book of crowning racial-Jewish chauvinism.
By way of correction, if Mr. Grubach is too busy to read this writer's book "Judaism Discovered" he can freely peruse the following brief article, "The Truth About the Talmud: http://talmudical.blogspot.com/
Michael HoffmanCoeur d'Alene, Idaho
***
On Sep 6, 2010, at 11:50, Grub222 wrote:
http://www.inconvenienthistory.com/archive/2010/volume_2/number_3/christianity_judaism_and_german_national_socialism.phpA Quarterly Journal for Free Historical InquiryPublished by: HBB Press
History Behind Bars
Christianity, Judaism and German National Socialism: Revisionism Confronts the Theology of Susannah Heschel
Paul Grubach
copyright 2010
In the interests of fairness, Susannah Heschel was sent the following essay prior to its publication here, and asked to correct any possibly false or misleading statements. Ms. Heschel never responded.Does Theology Matter?Even atheists and skeptics admit that Christianity and the other equally influential religions exert a decisive impact upon world affairs. A leading historian of the ancient world, Michael Grant, in his history of the Jewish people during the Roman era, pinpointed religion's effect upon mankind with this astute observation: "For religion is an immensely significant part of secular history: whether god-given or delusive, its beliefs and cults have guided people more powerfully than any other force."1 The premier skeptic, eighteenth-century Scottish philosopher David Hume, would agree. Although he contended that Christianity was "superstition," he also seriously doubted that it could ever be eliminated, as it would continue to exercise its influence far into future centuries.2Regardless of your religious or anti-religious beliefs, one must accept that the Christian religion—along with Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and others—will continue to exert a decisive impact upon human affairs long after all of us are dead and gone. Whether you like it or not, theology really matters.Susannah Heschel, a Jewish theologian and researcher into Christian-Jewish relations, is widely considered to be a leading authority on Christian theology in National Socialist Germany, having published a long list of studies on this topic. Her most recent book (and probably her most important), The Aryan Jesus: Christian Theologians and the Bible in Nazi Germany, received very favorable reviews in mainstream publications. As the present century marches on, the issues of Christianity's relationship to the Judaic religion, the Jewish people, and racial nationalism are becoming ever more important. This is one reason why Heschel's writings are of great interest, as her research addresses these topics.The following essay is not an attempt to prove that Christianity is either true or false, or to convert anyone to any religious or anti-religious belief. Our purpose is to address (at least in part) these issues. Are there social, political or religious factors that are distorting Susannah Heschel's theological viewpoints? Does Susannah Heschel—like many other intellectuals and politicians in the West—apply a hypocritical double standard to the Jewish religion, National Socialism, Israel and the Zionist movement? Is Heschel's view of Christianity's relationship to Judaism accurate? Was there any truth to some of the religious viewpoints of Germany's National Socialist theologians? Was Jesus Christ really Jewish or was he of another ethnicity? Did the Evangelist Paul attempt to turn Christianity into a "Jewish religion?" Was at least some of what the National Socialist theologians believed consistent with a Christian message? What do Christianity and Judaism teach about ethnic nationalism? On what theological issues were the National Socialist theologians in error? Are there any similarities between Judaism and National Socialism? Are Judaism and National Socialism similar in their opposition to miscegenation? Are Jewish studies of Christianity motivated by an ulterior agenda? Are many Jews the enemy of Jesus Christ and Christianity? Was Jesus Christ really a militant opponent of the Jewish religion as some National Socialists claimed?These are not idle questions. Indeed, the future political and religious landscape of the world will be impacted by theological issues of this nature.Susannah Heschel: Her Ethnic/Religious/Political Background and Ideological BiasesSusannah Heschel is the daughter of the prominent Jewish scholar and religious activist Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), who was born in Poland, fled Europe in 1939 and subsequently became a US citizen.3 He is generally considered to be one of the most important theologians of Judaism of his era. In the 1960s, he became an ardent supporter of the Black American movement for racial integration, as he marched with Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma, Alabama.4 Like many other Jewish intellectuals and activists in his camp, he operated with a hypocritical double standard. Rabbi Heschel worked to create a racially integrated society in the United States. Yet, he was a zealous supporter of what Israeli scholar Uri Davis has shown to be the racially/ethnically segregated state of Israel. Indeed, the title of Davis's book says it all—Israel: An Apartheid State.5The elder Heschel even wrote a religious tract, Israel: An Echo of Eternity, devoted to the racist Jewish country in the Middle East: daughter Susannah gave her endorsement to the book, as she wrote an approving Introduction in a later edition.6 Although Ms. Heschel claims that her father spoke out against the oppression of Palestinians by Israel in the years prior to his death, he still viewed the Zionist state with mystical reverence. This statement typifies his beliefs: "For all who read the Hebrew Bible with biblical eyes the state of Israel is a solemn intimation of God's trace in history."7 Throughout his life, Abraham Heschel attempted to articulate a religious position for left-wing Zionists and Israelis.8Currently, Susannah Heschel is the Eli Black Professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College. She has a very strong Jewish identity, having written: "I have a passion for Jewishness, for every manifestation of it, from Workmen's Circle to Chasidic shtibls. My passion came to me as mother's milk, from wanting to emulate the Jews around me."9 In 2005, the Jewish weekly Forward identified her as a candidate for the World Zionist Congress. She was then a member of The Green Zionist Alliance, which was described as advocating "an environmentalist-peace slate."10 Her political position is similar to her father's, and can be depicted as leftist-religious-Zionist.In her 1998 study of the nineteenth century Jewish theologian and historian Abraham Geiger, Heschel revealed the decisive influence that her religious/cultural surroundings had upon her outlook: "Above all, I have come to understand the history of Jewish-Christian relations in Germany through the German Jews I have been privileged to meet since my childhood."11 In her most recent book, The Aryan Jesus, she again reveals where many of her views came from: "My childhood home was filled with German-Jewish refugee scholars who vividly illuminated for me the intellectual world that was destroyed. I want to thank my father for conveying to me a taste of the Germany he experienced in the 1920s and '30s, and for constantly reminding me, Never Despair!"12 There is little doubt that Heschel's views have been profoundly shaped by a Judeocentric interpretation of the Jewish-German conflict of the Second World War.In Germany during the era of the Third Reich she rightly points out that "theological scholarship was also shaped by contemporary politics."13 As we shall soon see, "contemporary politics" also impacts her theological scholarship. Although Heschel's books and essays are well written, interesting and intellectually stimulating, she lets her Jewish identity and Zionist politics act as distorting influences upon her work.Professor Heschel emphasizes how the Holocaust ideology traumatized her. She says that family members were murdered by the Germans: "Within my family certain horrors stood out. The murder of family members was so terrible that it was discussed only rarely, perhaps once in five years, and then only in whispers. Mentioning even briefly what had happened to my grandmother, for example, caused a depression that hung over our household for days."14She experienced a sense of horror while examining documents in the Central Archives of the Protestant Church, located in the former West Berlin, which dealt with the activities and beliefs of bishops, pastors, and professors who were passionately opposed to the Jewish people during the Third Reich. After hearing the archivist defend the activities and claims of these pro-National Socialist Germans and the German cause, she "trembled uncontrollably," and the next morning "woke up covered with hives."15Heschel's theological viewpoints are profoundly shaped by the assumption that the traditional Holocaust story is an unquestionable fact. She emphasizes that "the Nazi regime carried out its genocide of the Jews" during "the six years of its existence," and was "deeply moved" by her German friends' "understanding of the enormity of German crimes."16 And of course, she firmly believes the Germans murdered Jews in "gas chambers" with Zyklon B gas.17 Taking a quote from her father, Heschel writes that "Auschwitz is in our [the Jewish people's] veins."18Heschel ignores the fact that her traditional Holocaust story is not only a feeble ideology that cannot be substantiated with physical/forensic evidence, but also, much of it can be shown to be false. Consider this. In December 2009, one of the widely recognized authorities on the Auschwitz concentration camp, Robert Jan van Pelt, admitted that: "Ninety-nine per cent of what we know [about the Auschwitz extermination story] we do not actually have the physical evidence to prove…" Professor van Pelt added this most telling statement: "We in the future—remembering the Holocaust—will operate in the same way that we remember most things from the past. We will know about it from literature and eyewitness testimony…"19Here we have a Dutch-Jewish academic who was recognized by the British legal system as an expert on the alleged Auschwitz "gas chamber" technology, admitting that there really is no physical/scientific evidence to prove that those "homicidal gas chambers" ever existed! The "truth" of the orthodox Auschwitz extermination story is ultimately based upon eyewitness testimony—really no different from a religious dogma that has only eyewitness testimony to substantiate it. Other genocidal mass killings of the past, such as the Katyn Forest massacre committed by the Soviet Secret Police in the 1940s, have abundant, undeniable physical/forensic evidence to prove that they actually occurred.20Furthermore, just like other influential intellectuals in her camp, Heschel overlooks all the scientific evidence that discredits the traditional Holocaust story. As an example, consider the revisionist studies of the alleged Auschwitz "gas chambers." Fred Leuchter was at one time the main authority on gas-chamber technology in the United States. Though flawed, his forensic study of the "Auschwitz extermination technology" dealt a damaging blow to this legend.21 A more thorough and scientifically accurate study of the Auschwitz "gas chambers" was carried out by the German scientist Germar Rudolf. Rudolf's meticulous inquiry showed beyond a reasonable doubt that the traditional Auschwitz extermination story is false.22 The present German government was unable to refute Rudolf's expert report and his other Revisionist studies of the "Holocaust" with reason and evidence. The only thing they could do is imprison him for telling the truth.In a series of well documented and skillfully argued studies, Revisionist historians Carlo Mattogno and Jürgen Graf discredited the claim that "homicidal mass gassings" of Jews took place at the Treblinka, Majdanek and Belzec concentration camps.23 Heschel and her group of pro-Zionist intellectuals have conveniently ignored all of the foregoing Revisionist evidence.Heschel criticized the Christian Church's past ideological dominance, as she referred to "the institutional power of the [Christian] church that transformed falsehoods into accepted truth, a system of power that more recent theorists have termed an 'ideological regime.'"24 In the Western world of the past, Heschel continues, "the dominant ideology was a Christian one, attempting to present itself as secular moral and cultural values and equating Christianity with the highest expression of religion, rather than as one particular religion whose claims required justification before the bar of reason and historical investigation."25Likewise, a very similar statement could be used to describe Heschel's traditional view of the Holocaust. The institutional power of the Jewish-Zionist power elite has transformed "Holocaust" falsehoods into accepted truth, a system of power that could be rightly termed an "ideological regime of the Holocaust." The only unquestionable ideology in the Western World today is that of the "Holocaust," as it has been elevated to the status of a secular religion. In the Western world, the Holocaust religion does not require justification before the bar of reason and historical investigation. Quite the contrary! It cannot even be disputed in "respectable" forums. Belief in it is strictly enforced with taboos, underhanded tactics and prison sentences in many European nations for people who dispute it. Indeed, in America and Europe the Holocaust is to be slavishly accepted as "historical fact," and any "Holocaust deniers" are to be persecuted and/or denied a public forum in mainstream discourse. The intolerant Holocaust religion is the ideological backdrop of Heschel's theological and historical views.Rarely does Heschel point out where the National Socialist intellectuals put forth an accurate viewpoint. Much of the time she simply condemns and demonizes them, implicitly or explicitly. Yet, whether she is aware of it or not, some of her declarations actually support National Socialist viewpoints. Consider this example. Heschel admits that the Jewish community is an alien element among Christian European societies, for she wrote: "Although the Jews did not constitute a territorial colony of Europe, they formed an internal colony in Europe, under the domination of Christian powers."26 Later on in the same essay she adds: "As much as Jews are inside the Christian world, they are also outsiders; they occupy a position of ambivalence and ambiguity that functions as a kind of counter-history to the multicultural account of the West: not all White Europeans are Christians."27 Interestingly enough, this is similar to the belief of an intellectual forefather of National Socialist ideology, Paul de Lagarde (whom Heschel refers to twice in The Aryan Jesus). In the words of George L. Mosse, a Jewish historian whose research Heschel relies upon: "Lagarde felt that their religion kept Jews separate, and that they were in fact a coherent and dangerous minority within the Christian state."28Finally, as we shall see in the following sections, Heschel's writings are plagued with a hypocritical double standard. She condemns (implicitly or explicitly) aspects of German National Socialism that are also characteristic of her own beliefs and the sources of her identity—Jewish culture and Israel.Zionism and National Socialism: Heschel's Hypocritical Double Standard on the Race IssueIn her books and essays Heschel sends the message that ethnic/racial nationalism is evil and bad for non-Jews, while at the same time she supports ethnic nationalism—that is, Zionism —for Jews. Heschel is also a critic of White Christian civilization, for she has written: "When the story of male, white, Christian Western civilization is related, should not its cultural glories be tempered with the evidence of its racism and misogyny?"29 Likewise with Heschel's Judaism: when the story of Jewish history is related, should not its cultural glories be tempered with the evidence of its racism and misogyny?In her magnum opus, The Aryan Jesus, she consistently condemns as "racist" non-Jewish movements of racial nationalism, like German National Socialism and the former South African Apartheid society.30 Yet, I cannot find anywhere where she specifically condemns Jewish-Zionist ethnic nationalism and ethnic/racial segregation in Israel. Quite the contrary! She ardently supports the apartheid Zionist state.To be fair, Heschel has criticized certain actions of the Zionist movement and Israeli government, but makes it clear that she is a "strong Zionist." We give you Susannah Heschel in her own words from a October 2002 essay: "Many of us on campus are deeply critical of what we consider to be gross violations of human rights committed by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and yet we are strong Zionists. Unlike the Likud Party, we believe two states need to be established, Israel and Palestine, for reasons of politics, security and morality."31Heschel piously insists she wants to follow in her father's footsteps, as she chooses to raise her daughters with "the spirit of Selma [Alabama]."32 (This is the Southern city in the United States where Martin Luther King Jr. marched to achieve racial integration.) That is, she wants to instill in her descendants a desire to build egalitarian and racially integrated societies—everywhere outside of her beloved Israel. In regard to the Jewish state in the Middle East her "morality" demands that she supports segregation, where Jews and Palestinian Arabs would live in separate states.A recent US State Department report shows that the object of Heschel's ethnic/religious identity, Israel, is an intolerant society that discriminates against non-Jews and where Jewish supremacy is the order of the day—a fact that is in total conflict with her left-wing politics. The Zionist state falls short in tolerance toward minorities, equal treatment of ethnic groups, openness toward various streams within society, and respect for holy and other sites. The US State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor documented how Israel discriminates against Muslims, Jehovah's Witnesses, Reform Jews, Christians, women and Bedouin people. According to this comprehensive report, ""the government implements regulations only for Jewish sites. Non-Jewish holy sites do not enjoy legal protection under it because the government does not recognize them as official holy sites." Among other examples, the report notes that more than 300,000 immigrants who are not considered Jewish under rabbinical law are not allowed to marry and divorce or be buried in Jewish cemeteries.33Furthermore, Israeli law distinguishes between "citizenship" and "nationality." This legal artifice gives Jews special privileges that non-Jews are deprived of. The special status of "Jewish nationality" has been a way to undermine the citizenship rights of non-Jews, especially the fifth of the population who are Arab. Some thirty laws specifically favor Jews to the detriment of others, including in the areas of immigration rights, naturalization, access to land and employment.34 Despite the fact that the racial-integrationist "spirit of Selma, Alabama" is totally absent in Israel, the Jewish state still captivates Heschel's allegiance.The "anti-racist" Heschel supports her father's condemnation of "racism." She emphatically repeats what the elder Heschel preached : "Racism is Satanism, unmitigated evil…"35 If this is so, then daughter Heschel should abandon her Zionism, as it is a philosophy and violent movement that is firmly grounded in the anti-integrationist racial thought of the past and present.36 Echoing the feelings of a large number of Jews, the prominent Zionist leader Stephen S. Wise, a former president of the American Jewish Congress and the World Jewish Congress, told a New York rally in June 1938: "I am not an American citizen of the Jewish faith, I am a Jew…Hitler was right in one thing. He calls the Jewish people a race and we are a race."37Heschel refers to "Germany's military and racial goals of domination over Europe."38 Likewise with her Zionist movement—their racial goal was the domination of land occupied by Palestinian Arabs. With the use of archival evidence, Israeli historians Simha Flapan and ILan Pappe have demonstrated that from its very inception a central plank of Israel's founding ideology was the forcible removal of Palestinian Arabs and the creation of an ethnically homogenous, Jewish supremacist state.39In the words of a prophet of Zionism, Moses Hess, "Jews are not a religious group, but a separate nation, a special race, and the modern Jew who denies this is not only an apostate, a religious renegade, but a traitor to his people, his tribe, his race."40 In a similar vein, the founder of modern Zionism, Theodore Herzl, wrote: "I referred previously to our [Jewish] assimilation [with gentiles]. I do not for a moment wish to imply that I desire such an end. Our national character is too glorious in history and, in spite of every degradation, too noble to make its annihilation desirable."41 This is very significant. Both Heschels, the father and daughter, worked to promote racial integration and assimilation between whites and non-whites in the United States. Yet, both are on record as propounding an ideology that opposes integration and assimilation between Jews and non-Jews. Indeed, as the Jewish weekly Forward recently pointed out, separation between Jews and Palestinians is an integral platform of left-wing Zionism—the political movement that Susannah Heschel is a part of.42Heschel is fond of pointing out how National Socialism discriminated against Jews, but she fails to note that very similar discriminatory practices against non-Jews are in place in the Israeli state that has captivated her devotion. She says that Christian churches failed to condemn the Nazi laws that put Jews into a separate racial category and also banned non-Aryans from the German civil service.43 Yet, almost-identical laws are in place in her beloved Israel. In the Zionist state, racial categorization begins at birth. As the Israeli scholar Uri Davis has pointed out, the law is set up in such a manner that a Jewish infant is registered as having Israeli citizenship at birth, whereas an Arab newborn is stateless at birth, his citizenship status being indefinite.44American-Jewish scholar Ian Lustick pointed out that the Israeli military is, by and large, a segregated institution. Most Muslim Arabs, who constitute the overwhelming majority of Israeli Arab citizens, do not serve in the armed forces—they are not conscripted, nor are they permitted to volunteer for service. This has important social consequences. In Israel, participation in the armed services is a prerequisite to social advancement and mobility. Cut off from the military, they are cut off from access to one of the main avenues of social advancement.45 Just as National Socialist laws banned Jews from the German civil service, so too do Israeli practices and laws ban Arabs from social advancement and upward mobility.As the evolutionary psychologist Kevin MacDonald has cogently argued, German National Socialism and Jewish Zionism are mirror images of each other—something that the Abraham and Susannah Heschels of the world do not admit.46 It is clearly hypocritical for Heschel to act as a critic of National Socialist ethnic nationalism and discriminatory practices against Jews while she herself passionately identifies with a state and ideology that espouses a similar ethnic nationalism for Jews and practices a similar discrimination against non-Jews. In all of her work, Heschel never explains why (in her view) it was "morally wrong" for Germans to have been racial nationalists (i.e., National Socialists), yet, it was and is "morally correct" for Jews to be racial nationalists (i.e., Zionists). Professor Heschel, a theologian well immersed in religious ethics, never explains the moral dichotomy she has brought to light. Why it was "morally wrong" for Germans to have supported a National Socialist state that discriminated against Jews: yet, it is "morally correct" for Jews to ardently support a Zionist state that discriminates against non-Jews. This hypocritical racial double standard plagues all of her work.Heschel's Depiction of Christianity in National-Socialist GermanyDuring the era of the Third Reich, there were two major competing factions within German Protestantism. The Confessing Church held that the Old Testament, with its Jewish origins, formed a permanent part of the Christian religion. Although they were critical of Jewish influence, Confessing Church clerics accepted Jews who had undergone the rite of baptism into the Christian religion.47 Nonetheless, most members of this faction maintained support for the National Socialist government and they believed that Jews and Judaism were a degenerate moral and spiritual influence upon Christians.48The German Christians promoted a more radical, racial-ethnic oriented Christianity. They linked religion with ethnicity, which Heschel admits is also characteristic of Judaism.49 They were adamantly opposed to the Jews, and many of them contended that Jesus was not Jewish, and the Old Testament should be expunged from the Christian canon of sacred literature.50 Even so, at least some of them believed that there was religious value to the Old Testament, but its "Jewish spirit" needed to be eliminated. In a 1940 German Christian catechism it was stated: "What do we think of the Old Testament? Just as in a field grain and weeds grow together, so the Old Testament contains good and evil. We have reverence for its eternal truths about God, but we exterminate its Jewish spirit root and branch."51The German Christians also insisted that large portions of the New Testament needed to be revised in order to reconcile it with their racialist National Socialism.52 The German Christian movement rejected the idea of the Confessing Church that once a Jew had undergone the rite of Baptism he became a Christian.53 The movement's leaders believed that Baptism could not wipe away the imprint of race or ethnicity. On key issues the German Christians stood in opposition to the Confessing Church, and there was tension between the two factions throughout the Third Reich.54Heschel maintains that German Catholicism was in a position similar to that of the Confessing Church. Being theologically conservative, they refused to alter basic Christian doctrines, but nevertheless, they still maintained that Jews were a negative influence upon Christians.55In May 1939, a group of German Christian clerics, churchgoers and theologians founded the Institute for the Study and Eradication of Jewish Influence on German Church Life (hereafter referred to as "the Institute"). The Institute's goal's were to rid Christianity of Jewish influence, and to redefine Christianity as a Germanic religion whose founder, Jesus, was no Jew, but an enemy of the Jews, who had fought to destroy Judaism, but in the end fell as a victim in that struggle.56 Some members of this National Socialist think tank went so far as to claim that Jesus Christ was an Aryan, and Paul, as a Jew, had falsified Jesus's message.57The Institute's academic director, Walter Grundmann, was a prolific scholar and professor of New Testament and Völkish Theology at the University of Jena.58 He declared that just as Luther had overcome Catholicism during the Reformation, so too did Protestants have to overcome Judaism. This meant that the Bible would have to purged of the Old Testament—a platform that Confessing Church theologians rejected.59 In the post World War II era, Grundmann was an informant for the communist secret police in East Germany.60 To Susannah Heschel, Grundmann is a Satanic figure who is guilty of spreading propaganda lies. We shall see if this is so later on in this essay.The preceding depiction of Christianity during the Third Reich is based solely upon Professor's Heschel's writings. It is assumed to be reasonably accurate.Christianity's Relationship to Judaism: Is Heschel's View Correct?In response to the Institute's attempt to wipe out Jewish influence upon Christianity—that is, to "dejudaize" it—Heschel proposed an opposing view on the association between the two religions. In her theological outlook, Christianity is inextricably bound to Judaism, for she stated: "Christianity depends on Judaism for its central theological concepts."61 She developed this theme more completely in The Aryan Jesus: "The question of the dejudaization effort of the Institute has to be examined not only in terms of Third Reich politics, but as a Christian theological phenomenon that engaged a vast number of pastors, bishops, and academic theologians. Christianity came into being by resting on the theological foundations of Judaism; it is often said that Judaism and Christianity stand in mother-daughter relationship. Nearly every central theological concept of Christianity rests on a Jewish foundation, from messiah to divine election. Affirming what is central to Christian teaching usually entails an affirmation of a Jewish idea or a text from the Old Testament, so that attempting to eradicate the Jewish was a kind of 'theological bulimia.'"62Heschel's view is contradicted by that of one of her mentors, Abraham Geiger. In a discussion of the work and arguments of this nineteenth-century Jewish historian who wrote extensively on the historical background of Jesus and early Judaism, she stated: "The later dogma of Christian theology concerning Jesus—the virgin birth, the Incarnation, the Resurrection—were later theological inventions that resulted from pagan philosophical influences."63 So, in The Aryan Jesus she says that "nearly every central theological concept of Christianity rests on Jewish foundation, from messiah to divine election." Yet, in another book, she repeats the claim of a researcher who said that the most important dogmas of Christian theology—the Virgin Birth, the Incarnation, and the Resurrection—did not rest on a Jewish foundation, but were acquired from non-Jewish sources: Heschel never said that this was false.Directly refuting Heschel, some of the most important concepts of Christianity are totally foreign to Judaism. The central doctrine of the Trinity—three persons in one God (the Father, Son and Holy Spirit)—does not rest on a Jewish foundation. Heschel noted that before the fourteenth century, Judaism legally classified Christianity as "idolatry" for its trinitarianism.64 The Incarnation is another prime example—God became a human being in the person of Jesus Christ. Skeptics of the past, such as Voltaire, have pointed out that the Jewish religion regarded the idea of a God-man as "monstrous." These non-Christians contend that this Christian concept was borrowed from pagan sources such as the Romans, who deified mortals.65The late Holocaust historian Raul Hilberg also noted that the idea of a God-man is anathema to Judaism. This Jewish intellectual's view of Christian origins is much more accurate than Heschel's: "In the very early stages of the Christian faith, many Jews regarded Christians as members of a Jewish sect. The first Christians, after all, still observed the Jewish law. They had merely added a few nonessential practices, such as baptism, to their religious faith. But their view was changed abruptly when Christ was elevated to Godhood. The Jews have only one God. This God is indivisible. He is a jealous God and admits of no other gods. He is not Christ, and Christ is not He. Christianity and Judaism have since been irreconcilable. An acceptance of Christianity has since signified an abandonment of Judaism."66Hilberg's view is supported by the statement in John 5: 18. It is said that the Jews wanted to kill Jesus Christ because he put himself on the level of God: "This was why the Jews sought all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also called God his Father, making himself equal with God." Even if, as some skeptics say, this passage is not historically accurate because the event depicted never happened, it still accurately expresses one reason why religious Jews have rejected the Christian religion throughout the ages: the thought of a God-man is abhorrent to them. The Incarnation, arguably the most important concept in all of Christianity, does not rest on a Jewish foundation. Directly contradic
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