Friday, August 19, 2011

Benedict XVI and the Jews

If John Paul II was the Pope who caused momentous changes in relations with the Jews - just think of the historical visit to the Synagogue of Rome in 1986 and the visit to Israel in 2000 - his successor Benedict XVI was one of the theologians who further consolidated the unique and unmistakeable relationship that joins Christians with the people of the old Alliance. 

For Pope Ratzinger, in fact, the link between Christians and Jews is absolutely unique and unlike any other religion.

Both in his speeches and in his books, Benedict XVI has always attributed the duty of bearing witness of the one true God before the world to his "Jewish brothers". In the writings of Piero Stefani, a biblicist and professor of "dialogue with Judaism" at the Institute of Ecumenical Studies of Venice, we can confirm that from the Pope's writings we see "a recognition of the permanence of the vocation of Israel, which renders the Jewish people different from other peoples, a vocation that is not denied by the acceptance, or lack thereof, of Christ." 

Stefani goes on to explain that "for Ratzinger, the relationship between the Church and Judaism is not so much a question of asking for forgiveness from the Jews, but more the fact that recognising Abraham's legacy is a benediction promised to the Jewish people. The Jewish legacy continues in Jesus Christ and then in the Church."

The first steps

For some unknown providential design, both John Paul II and his successor experienced first hand Nazi totalitarianism and the persecution of Jews during the 1930s and 1940s. It is a fact to acknowledge when reading and interpreting their actions.

The visit to the Synagogue, the Jubilee request for forgiveness, the historical visit to the Holy Land where the Pope prayed before the Western Wall or the silence held before the eternal flame in Yad Vashem are incomprehensible without the experience lived in Poland by the young Karol Wojtyla.

And Joseph Ratzinger was also able to experience the anti-Semitic hate of that pagan ideology. On 29 December 2000, in the Osservatore Romano, the then cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith had written: "In the history of Christianity, relationships that were already difficult deteriorate further, giving rise in many cases to anti-Semitic behaviours which have produced deplorable acts of violence throughout history. Even if the last abominable experience of the Holocaust was perpetrated in the name of anti-Christian ideology, which aimed to attack Christian faith at its Abraham roots in the people of Israel, it cannot be denied that a certain insufficient resistance of Christians to these atrocities can be explained with the anti-Semitic legacy felt by some Christians". 

Ratzinger goes on to write that "Perhaps due to the dramatic nature of this last tragedy, a new vision of the relationship between the Church and Israel has been formed; a sincere desire to overcome any sort of anti-Semitism and to begin a constructive dialogue of mutual knowledge and reconciliation. To be successful, such a dialogue must begin with a prayer to our God to give Christians, first and foremost, more respect and love towards this people, the Israelites [...]"

Following his election, Benedict XVI sent a message to the chief Rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni: "On 19 April 2005, the cardinals of the Holy Roman Church elected me as Bishop of Rome and pastor of the Universal Church. In informing you of my election and the solemn inauguration of my papacy, Sunday 24 April, I trust in the assistance of God on High to continue this dialogue and strengthen the partnership with the sons and daughters of the Jewish people".   

This gesture was much appreciated by the Jewish community of Rome and was defined "unusual in the history of relationships between Jews and Christians", by Rabbi Di Segni.

Since his first official visit to Cologne for World Youth Day, Benedict XVI wished to include a visit to the Synagogue and at the time he spoke of the need to send a message of respect and friendship towards Jews to the new generations who had not lived the horror of the Holocaust: "It is a particularly important duty, in that today, unfortunately, new signs of anti-Semitism are emerging and various forms of generalised hostility towards foreigners are being seen."

Benedict XVI had also added that for the dialogue with his Jewish brothers "to be sincere, the existing differences must not be kept silent or minimised: even in things that, due to our intimate conviction of faith, make us different from one another; in fact, precisely in these things, we must respect each other." The Pope then visited a Synagogue in New York and on 17 January 2010 he repeated the historical gesture of his predecessor, crossing the threshold of the Synagogue of Rome. 

Ratzinger ensured that he wanted to "confirm and strengthen" the path traced by his predecessor, expressing the "respect and affection" of the Church for the Jewish people. He explained that the Council is "a constant point of reference for the behaviour and relationship with the Jewish people" and that the path of dialogue that has begun is "irrevocable". He affirmed that "The Church has not failed to deplore the failures of its sons and daughters, asking for forgiveness for all that has in some way favoured the plague of anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism."

The Pope then called for Christians and Jews to look towards the future, to work together starting from the common roots of the Ten Commandments, "the flame of morals", and proposed a commitment to respect life, the value of every single human being, especially foreigners and those who are weak.
 
A fundamental point in this relationship, which also saw moments of tension - the worst being in January 2009 during the excommunication of the four Lefebvre bishops, one of whom had made statements denying the existence of the gas chambers (although the Pope did not know this) - was Benedict XVI's visit to Israel in April 2009, where he stopped to pray before the Western Wall and pay homage to the victims of the Holocaust at the Yad Vashem memorial.

The Church's relationship with Israel

It is in the theological reflections of cardinal Ratzinger that the strong connection between Christians and Jews has been developed and these reflections have given way to the act of opening up and profession of kindness and deep respect that Benedict XVI has showed towards the people of the Old Alliance. 

In 1998, the cardinal devoted a book to this argument, translated into English in 1999 (Many Religions, One Covenant: Israel, the Church, and the World). In his book, the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith commented on the Catechism of the Catholic Church and explained that "Whilst the conflict of Jesus with the Judaism of his time is presented in a superficially controversial way, we derive from it an idea of liberation that can only consider the Torah as a servitude to exterior rites and rituals.

The view of the Catechism, initially traced back to Matthew, but successively defined by the whole of evangelical tradition, logically leads to a completely different perspective:  "The Law of the Gospel fulfils the commandments of the Law. The Lord's Sermon on the Mount, far from abolishing or devaluing the moral prescriptions of the old law, reveals hidden virtues and creates new needs: it reveals the whole divine and human truth. It does not add new external precepts, but proceeds to reform the root of actions, the heart, where man chooses between the pure and the impure, where faith, hope and charity are developed (...). The Gospel thus brings the Law to its height by imitating the perfection of the Heavenly Father."

The future Pope goes on to write that "Jesus did not act as a liberal, recommending and practising himself an open and accommodating interpretation of the law. In the comparison between Jesus and the Jewish authorities of his time we are not faced with a liberal, and a closed and rigid hierarchy in its traditionalism. Such a view, so widespread, misunderstands the conflict of the New Testament at its root; therefore neither Jesus nor Israel is acknowledged." 

Ratzinger adds that "Jesus embraced the law in a wholly theological way, in the knowledge and with the claim of acting in the most intimate unity with God the Father, as his Son, acting with the full authority of God. Only God, in fact, could interpret the law so radically and proclaim this transformation and conservation in the meaning truly intended by him."

In this context, Ratzinger also reflected on the meaning of Jesus' crucifixion: "The sin is responsible for the cross" and "the cross is the victory of God's love, which is stronger, over the cross." 

The future Pope states that "Since I was a child, although I naturally knew nothing of all the new knowledge summarised in the Catechism, it was incomprehensible to me that some wanted to see the death of Christ as a condemnation of the Jews, because this concept had already entered my soul as something that was able to give me profound consolation: the blood of Christ does not purport revenge; rather it calls for reconciliation."

In concluding his reflection on the relationship between Judaism and Christianity, Ratzinger wrote: "In the average reader, a commonplace will come to mind in which the Bible of the Jews, "The Old Testament", brings Jews and Christians together, while the faith in Jesus Christ as the son of God and redeemer separates them.  However, we can easily see how superficial a similar distinction is between what unites us and what separates us. In fact, I should first say that through Christ, the Bible of Israel reached non-Jews and also became their Bible. When the Letter to the Ephesians says that Christ broke down the wall that separated the Jews from the other religions of the world and restored unity, it is not empty theological rhetoric, but an entirely empirical observation, even though the full significance of the theological statement cannot be understood in empirical data. In fact, though the meeting with Jesus of Nazareth, the God of Israel became the God of all people. Through him the promise was fulfilled that the peoples would worship the God of Israel as the one and only God, that the "mountain of the Lord" would be exalted above all other mountains."

Ratzinger concludes that "if Israel cannot see the son of God in Jesus, as the Christians do, it is not absolutely impossible for them to recognise in him the servant of God, who brings the light of his God to the peoples. And vice versa, even if the Christians would like Israel to one day recognise Christ as the son of God, thus overcoming the fracture that still divides them, they would then be recognising God's plan, who entrusted Israel with his mission in "pagan times." 

The Fathers summarise it in the following way: Israel must remain before us as the first holder of the Sacred Scripture to bear witness before the world."