The Pope's Willing Executioners?

Yesterday I opened the book Hitler’s Willing Executioners, which made quite a stir several years ago. Here is the first sentence I read, the introductory sentence of Chapter 2:

“European anti-Semitism is a corollary of Christianity.”

Goldhagen, the author, goes on to state, without qualification, that Christianity has a “psychological and theological need … to differentiate themselves from the bearers of the religion from which their own had broken off.” He says the belief that Jews were “Christ-killers” was “axiomatic,” “according to passionate and continuous Christian teaching and preaching.” This view of Jews was “fundamental to Christian theology.” “The very definition of what it meant to be a Christian entailed a thoroughgoing and visceral hostility to Jews.” “The Jews were …considered to be barely human, if human at all.”

I’ve heard all this before, and Goldhagen properly footnotes it. But it is a load of rubbish. And worse than rubbish. It is hate speech.

Firstly, if Christianity is obliged to be hostile to Jews in order to differentiate itself, it follows that Jews also have this need, and must equally hate Christianity. Meaning, then, that early Christianity would have been right to treat them as enemies after all.

Indeed, the anti-Christian hostility among Jews, by this principle, must have been greater. It has been fairly easy for the average Christian at most times to forget entirely about the existence of the Jews, a tiny minority in Christian lands. It has been a bit more difficult for Jews to forget the presence of Christianity, the majority population among which they lived, and so it must have been a more visible and constant challenge to their beliefs.

But why, in any event, should Christianity need to differentiate itself? Why should it care whether it is considered a form of Judaism? Indeed, so it apparently thought of itself, until the Jews threw it out of the synagogue. In other words, the need to differentiate seems to have been greater on the Jewish side. It follows, on this premise, that their hostility must have been greater.

But again, if those who break away ideologically must nurse a permanent hostility, where is the permanent hostility of Americans towards British and Canadians? And do sons have a natural antipathy to their fathers?

Or is it only in religion? Then where is the permanent hostility of Buddhism for Hinduism? Or Methodism for the Church of England? Or Catholicism for Eastern Orthodoxy?

No; the idea that Christianity requires hostility to Judaism is nonsense. Just the reverse: as most of the Christian Bible, including the New Testament, is written by people who considered themselves Jews and from the Jewish perspective, their Christian religion is more likely to prompt Christians to identify with the Jews than to hate them.
The Jews killed Christ? No doubt such claims have been made from pulpits at some place and time, but they are not theologically sound, and never were. The Bible states plainly that Jesus was killed by the Roman authorities. And, of course, was a Jew.

No, Christianity and religion had nothing to do with the persecution of Jews throughout European history, though it was no doubt wheeled out as a justification. How could it? The Jews were persecuted already in pagan Roman antiquity; Titus was not Christian. And in Christian history, the persecution of the Jews has definite parallels: the persecution of the Knights Templar, the suppressions of the Jesuits, and the common hostility to the Masonic Lodges. None of these were obviously religiously divergent from the general population—two were Catholic religious orders. What they have in common with Judaism is not this, but secrecy and wealth.

All were relatively secretive and apparently close-knit groups—cabals, to use the term used originally for the Jews--that kept mostly to themselves and that grew extremely successful, especially financially. Because they kept to themselves, they became convenient as scapegoats. Because they were secretive, it was possible to believe conspiracy theories about them. Because they were small in numbers, they were vulnerable to pogrom. And because they were wealthy, and often lent money, there was great financial incentive in attacking them, destroying their records, and seizing their assets. Especially for their debtors.

People who, like Goldhagen, falsely claim that there is some innate and necessary hostility between Christianity and Judaism are sowing hate and fomenting conflict. The only question is whether their intended target is Christianity or Judaism. Ironically, Goldhagen is doing to Christianity exactly what he falsely accuses Christianity of doing to Judaism: misrepresenting it as a doctrine of hate, defaming it.

I suspect he is no fairer to the Germans.