Church of God News

Anti-Semitic protestor in Berlin (Boris Niehaus)

COGwriter

Israel365News posted the following:

Natan Sharansky issues warning that antisemitism has become ‘mainstream’

January 13, 2023

Speaking at the annual Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) Advisory Board meeting last night, Chairman Natan Sharansky sais: “For the last 20 years, we could say antisemitism is on the rise, so what makes this year different? In the past, we’ve talked about antisemitism on the left, and antisemitism on the right. This year it became mainstream.”Sharansky was joined by fellow CAM Advisory Board members such as former Senator Joe Lieberman, former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada Irwin Cotler, former United Nations Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief Ahmed Shaheed and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Guatemala Mario Adolfo Búcaro Flores,

Sharansky also emphasized that the United Nations has attempted to “delegitimize” Israel, and holds double standards toward Israel. Board members joined from all over the world, including North America, Europe, and the Middle East.

All of this is happening within a context of extreme polarization everywhere, Sharansky added, making it “difficult to have one weapon” with which to help suppress antisemitism. “We need to unite people on the left and the right,” Sharansky said to the board, “against the new forms of antisemitism; and look for new allies. Against a huge rise in antisemitism today, we need a very broad front.”  …

Many board members also agreed on the need to deal with the more subtle forms of antisemitism, not just the obvious elements such as swastika graffiti. https://www.israel365news.com/365373/natan-sharansky-issues-warning-that-antisemitism-has-become-mainstream/

As far as antisemitism going mainstream, consider the following from the Temple Institute’s latest newsletter:

Tevet 20, 5783/January 13, 2023

The Time Is Ripe To Take Back The Temple Mount Ever since Israel’s new Minister of Internal Security Itamar Ben Gvir made an early morning ascent to the Temple Mount last week, the Temple Mount has been headlining in the international news. While the response of the western democrats to Ben Gvir’s walk on the Mount was both pathetic and despicable, the hypocritical uproar has prompted many writers and activists and public figures to publish articles not only defending ben Gvir’s act, but call for the elimination of the so called “status quo” which is nothing more than a racist which denies Jews their inalienable right to ascend and pray on the Temple Mount, but also allows Muslims unfettered freedom to destroy ancient Temple artifacts while repurposing buildings on the Mount to be used a mosques, all the while using the Temple Mount to incite hatred and violence to Jews, which has already cost many lives.

Truly, it was not wrong for a Jewish political leader to walk on the area in Israel called the Temple Mount.

But, yes, he was condemned for it (see Ben Gvir is criticized for going to ‘Temple Mount’ and is being pressured to push for Jewish Passover sacrifice).

Antisemitism was the official position of the pagan, sun-god worshiping, Roman emperor Constantine in the fourth century (who is considered as an Eastern Orthodox saint). Note that he stated:

Let us then have nothing in common with the detestable Jewish crowd; for we have received from our Saviour a different way. ( Eusebius’ Life of Constantine, Book III chapter 18)

The way that Jesus, who was Jewish, taught differently was love. Jesus never taught to have ‘nothing in common with the detestable Jewish crowd.’ Roman Catholics refer to Constantine as ‘Constantine the Great,’ but he obviously held anti-semitic views.

Scholars, including the late French Cardinal Jean-Guenole-Marie Danielou. Dr. Danielou taught that church history has generally been mistaught and that the original Christian church was quite “Jewish.” And he specifically wrote that the misteaching of the Jewishness of the faith has led to a “false picture of Christian history” (Daniélou J, Cardinal. The Theology of Jewish Christianity. Translated by John A. Baker. The Westminster Press, 1964, Philadelphia, p. 2).

Anyway, it is well known by scholars that the first 15 bishops/overseers of Jerusalem were circumcised Jews that:

• Kept the seventh day Sabbath
• Kept the biblical Holy Days including keeping Passover on the 14th and not a Sunday morning.
• Did not eat biblically unclean meat

These practices were also in Asia Minor as can be documented into the third century.

The early Christian church was considered a sect of the Jews by the Roman authorities. It was not considered to even be a separate religion for a time.

Constantine was not just objecting to Jews, but to those who held to original Christian practices that he declared were too Jewish. He also ordered Christians in Jerusalem should be killed if they would not eat pork.

Constantine never really understood, nor practiced, the Beliefs of the Original Catholic Church.

Instead of promoting Christian love, around 332, Constantine issued what is known as the Edict Against the Heretics which included persecution against Christians who held to the original faith and had practices, such as the date of Passover, the same as the Jews (see also Persecutions by Church and State).

Decades later, in 387, the Eastern Orthodox saint and bishop John Chrysostom preached the following:

The festivals of the pitiful and miserable Jews are soon to march upon us one after the other and in quick succession: the feast of Trumpets, the feast of Tabernacles, the fasts. There are many in our ranks who say they think as we do. Yet some of these are going to watch the festivals and others will join the Jews in keeping their feasts and observing their fasts. I wish to drive this perverse custom from the Church right now…If the Jewish ceremonies are venerable and great, ours are lies…Does God hate their festivals and do you share in them? He did not say this or that festival, but all of them together. (John Chrysostom. Homily I Against the Jews I:5;VI:5;VII:2. Preached at Antioch, Syria in the Fall of 387 AD. Medieval Sourcebook: Saint John Chrysostom (c.347-407) : Eight Homilies Against the Jews. Fordham University. http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/chrysostom-jews6.html 12/10/05).

John Chrysostom preached the following in his Homily Against the Jews (of which there are at least eight anti-Semitic homilies):

But do not be surprised that I called the Jews pitiable. They really are pitiable and miserable (I:II:1).

So the godlessness of the Jews and the pagans is on a par. But the Jews practice a deceit which is more dangerous (I:VI:4).

Do you see that demons dwell in their souls and that these demons are more dangerous than the ones of old? (I:VI:7).

Since it is against the Jews that I wish to draw up my battle line, let me extend my instruction further. Let me show that, by fasting now, the Jews dishonor the law and trample underfoot God’s commands because they are always doing everything contrary to his decrees. When God wished them to fast, they got fat and flabby (VI:IV:2).

Indeed, the fasting of the Jews, which is more disgraceful than any drunkenness, is over and gone (VIII:I:5).

John Chrysostom is considered to be a major Roman Catholic saint. He is one of the four ‘doctors of the church’ who is shown supporting a large black chair that is called the Cathedra Petri (Chair of Peter) in St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City. The late Joseph Tkach of the old Worldwide Church of God once referred to this chair as Satan’s throne (see Might Satan’s throne be the ‘Cathedra Petri’?).

The improperly named Protestant publication Christianity Today once had a link titled, “Person of the Week: John Chrysostom” which went to an article titled: John Chrysostom Early church’s greatest preacher. So, many Protestants too, endorse an anti-Semite. More on him can be found in the article John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople and Antisemite.

It perhaps should be pointed out that sometimes those in the true Church of God have been considered to be secretly Jews by some in Greco-Roman faiths:

In the Middle Ages, the Popes and the Councils were successful in destroying the Jewish revolutionary movements which appeared within Christianity in the form of false teaching and which were introduced by those who were Christians in appearance but Jews in secret. The latter then recruited upright and good Christians for the arising heretical movement by persuading the latter in a crafty way.

The secret Jews organised and controlled in secret manner the movements, which were the creative and driving force of wicked false teachings, such as those of the Iconoclasts, the Cathars, the Patarines, the Albigensians, the Hussites, the Alumbrados and others. (Pinay, Maurice. The Plot Against the Church, Part Four Chapter One. Translated from the German and Spanish editions of the same work. 1962)

The above book is still recommended by and for many Catholics (though some others distance themselves from it). Hence, some of the Greco-Romans have considered some of whom we in the Continuing Church of God include in our tracing of our spiritual ancestors (like some of the Cathars and Albigenses) to have been a secret Jewish group that only professed Christ.

As far as Protestant leaders themselves with anti-Semitic views, one can notice some of the teachings of Martin Luther, who wrote in the 16th century:

My heart is fuller of these thoughts than my tongue can tell. I have come to the conclusion that the Jews will always curse and blaspheme God as all the prophets have predicted. He who neither reads nor understands this, as yet knows no theology, in my opinion. And so I presume the men of Cologne cannot understand the Scripture, because it is necessary that such things take place to fulfill prophecy. If they are trying to stop the Jews blaspheming, they are working to prove the Bible and God liars (“Martin Luther’s to George Spalatin,” from Luther’s Correspondence and Other Contemporan, Letters, trans. by P. Smith (1913), Vol. 1, pp. 28-29).

Furthermore he wrote:

I had made up my mind to write no more either about the Jews or against them. But since I learned that those miserable and accursed people do not cease to lure to themselves even us, that is, the Christians, I have published this little book, so that I might be found among those who opposed such poisonous activities of the Jews and who warned the Christians to be on their guard against them…They are so blind and stupid that they see neither the words found in Genesis 17 nor the whole of Scripture, which mightily and explicitly condemns this lie…They are real liars and bloodhounds who have not only continually perverted and falsified all of Scripture with their mendacious glosses from the beginning until the present day. Their heart’s most ardent sighing and yearning and hoping is set on the day on which they can deal with us Gentiles as they did with the Gentiles in Persia at the time of Esther…The worse a Jew is, the more arrogant he is, solely because he is a Jew — that is, a person descended from Abraham’s seed, circumcised, and under the law of Moses. David and other pious Jews were not as conceited as the present-day, incorrigible Jews…I wanted to present this to us Germans so that we might see what rascals the blind Jews are and how powerfully the truth of God in our midst stands with us and against them (Medieval Sourcebook: Martin Luther (1483-1546): On the Jews and Their Lies, 1543)

Martin Luther advised his followers:

…to burn down Jewish schools and synagogues, and to throw pitch and sulphur into the flames; to destroy their homes; to confiscate their ready money in gold and silver; to take from them their sacred books, even the whole Bible; and if that did not help matters, to hunt them of the country like mad dogs (Luther’s Works, vol. Xx, pp. 2230-2632 as quoted in Stoddard JL. Rebuilding a Lost Faith, 1922, p.99).

Accordingly, it must and dare not be considered a trifling matter but a most serious one to seek counsel against this and to save our souls from the Jews, that is, from the devil and from eternal death. My advice, as I said earlier, is: First, that their synagogues be burned down, and that all who are able toss in sulphur and pitch (Martin Luther (1483-1546): On the Jews and Their Lies, 1543 as quoted from Luther’s Works, Volume 47: The Christian in Society IV, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971). pp 268­293).

Leaders esteemed by the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholics, and Protestants have all advocated horrible antisemitism. They were NOT real Christians.

Many people hate others, and the Jews tend to be one of the more hated groups. But that is not how people are to live.

Notice something that God had Moses record:

8 You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord. (Leviticus 19:18)

It is not just Jews that are hated or will be in the future. Throughout history, true Christians have sometimes been called “Jews” and have been subject to persecution supposedly directed towards Jews. True Christians also had to suffer through the so-called Inquisition, which utilized torture against those that had Church of God beliefs–and more is expected in the future (see Persecutions by Church and State). Protestant leaders have also promoted antisemitism and Church of God persecution (see The Similarities and Dissimilarities between Martin Luther and Herbert W. Armstrong) and Eastern Orthodox (see John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople and Antisemite).

There was a poem many years ago by Martin Niemöller:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

The Bible teaches:

1 Cry aloud, spare not;
Lift up your voice like a trumpet;
Tell My people their transgression,
And the house of Jacob their sins. (Isaiah 58:1)

Antisemitism is wrong. Pointing that sin out is in line with Isaiah 58:1.

Real Christians have always been on the side of being persecuted and have never been on the side of the persecutors. And this will be true again in the future.

People should not be antisemitic. People should not hate others.

Anyway although some Roman Catholic and Protestant leaders are trying to teach against antisemitism, prophetically, however, this will not last. The underlying antisemitism in Europe will again flourish when the time comes when the Beast’s government mandates it (Revelation 13:15-17).

Lessening of it now should be encouraged. Yet, many in the mainstream take the wrong and hateful view.

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 13th, 2023 at 4:00 pm and is filed under Religious News.

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