Pope John Paul II at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in March 2000. A reactionary, the Pope has taken a firm liberal line in only one theological area - the attitude toward Jews and Judaism.
How is it possible to turn one's back on the past without calling into question the authority of the present? If all the men of God erred in a matter as crucial as the Jews' guilt for the death of Christ, how can we be certain that they were not wrong about other things? In its delicate minuet these days, the Catholic Church is trying to dance on tiptoe without treading on too many blisters
THE VATICAN - At the end of March, on a gray and chilly day, Saint Peter's Square is overflowing with visitors. Long, long lines cross this beautiful piazza, surrounded by Bernini's colonnade, waiting to be checked at the metal detectors. Somewhat ahead of me in the line, three people "of Middle Eastern appearance" are spirited away for further checking. I pass through the apparatus and it beeps in annoyance (I have a tape recorder, coins and keys in my pockets); I stop and wait for the usual body check. The policeman looks at me tiredly and nods - go ahead. Imponderable.
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On the facade of the basilica, beneath the huge inscription attesting to the fact that the structure was completed in the days of Pope Paul V of the House of Borghese - a modest expression of papal humility - workers are setting up a stage decorated in royal purple. The stage is intended for another ceremony of canonizing new saints that is due to take place on the following day.
Pope John Paul II is the most prolific canonizer in the history of the papacy. Until his day, the papacy was very miserly about saints. Ancient canon law warns the Pope to be wary of inflation, lest the masses take saints lightly. The Pope must accede to a request to canonize only after many pleas and thorough investigations, and after having piled up obstacle after obstacle before the petitioners. John Paul II scorns the bureaucratic caution of his predecessors. Why shouldn't more communities have saints of their own, a source of pride and identification? The Curia also urged the Pope to travel little, lest the masses take the head of the Catholic Church lightly. John Paul II has ignored them. There has never been a Pope who has toured the world so widely, and his status, even as an ill and trembling old man, is unshaken. This Pope has ruled the Catholic Church for more than 25 years with a stern hand, and one day he too will join the long list of saints of the Catholic Church.
The first non-Italian Pope since the 16th century is a conservative - some even say a reactionary. His positions on the marriage of priests, the ordination of woman, homosexuality and the use of birth control devices despite the AIDS epidemic have elicited criticism from liberals both inside and outside the Church. He has taken an aggressive and firm liberal line in only one theological area - the attitude toward Jews and Judaism.
Prisoner in the Vatican
I am in Rome preparing an article on the Catholic Church and the Jews. An appointment was made for me with Cardinal Walter Kasper, who heads the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity - that is, he is in charge of ties with rival-sister Christian churches. He also heads the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.
The transition from Saint Peter's Square to the cardinal's office building in one of the small lanes around the Vatican is very sharp. There is something gray and functional that sends a message of modern mustiness; not the glory of the past, not the Swiss Guards' charmingly anachronistic uniforms, not the splendid vestments of bishops and cardinals and not even the impressive robes of the monks; just a creaky, outdated elevator and ordinary office furniture that has known better days. The cardinal is wearing his everyday garb, an unremarkable black suit. Only the strip of white peeking out of his round collar and the fisherman's ring on his finger indicate that the wearer is a prince of the Church, one of the most ancient institutions in the world, which is headed by God's deputy on earth.
Before becoming a cardinal and a functionary in the pontifical apparatus, Kasper, a native of Germany, was the bishop of Rottenberg-Stuttgart and a professor of theology. He looks younger than his 71 years. He arrives late for the appointment and greets me with that mechanical, somewhat tired heartiness of someone who is used to public business.
We have met in the past. About two years ago in Paris I held conversations with him and others about the possibility of re-establishing a committee of historians to research the activities of Pope Pius XII during World War II. On behalf of Tel Aviv University, I stipulated the unrestricted opening of the archives as a condition for establishing the committee. The Church refused and the discussions ended without results. I remind Kasper of that meeting and ask him what he thought would have happened had Karol Wojtyla, John Paul II, and not Eugenio Pacelli, Pius XII, been Pope at the time. He laughed. It is hard to know, of course. The circumstances were different. John Paul II is living in the era after Vatican II; in terms of mentality, Pius XII lived in an entirely different world. He defends Pius: The Pope was in fact a prisoner in the Vatican. The SS was in Rome. The Pope was in no way an anti-Semite, declares Kasper; the documents that have already been released for publication testify to this. Does personality not play a role, I wonder. The cardinal acknowledges that there is a difference not only in the circumstances but also in the characters of the two figures. Pius thought and acted like a diplomat, John Paul like a prophet.
This is an interesting distinction. One might find in it a recognition that the Pope is not simply a prisoner of historical circumstances. It could have been possible otherwise.
Kasper is not enthusiastic about the need to go back and deal with the matter of anti-Semitism in Mel Gibson's film. Everything has already been said, he protests. The Church's stance is absolutely clear. He has nothing new to say. When at the end of our meeting I look at my notes, I have to admit that he is right, at least as far as saying anything new goes. This is in part because the things he has said have already been said and partly because a person does not become a high official in the Catholic Church without priestly qualities. Kasper is a diplomat. He weighs his words very carefully. When he is not quoting from the Church's official statements, he maintains ambiguity. This is a classic bureaucratic survival mechanism.
Nevertheless, I insist, what does he think about Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ?" This is not a Catholic Church film, he replies. He has seen it himself and was shocked by the cruelty and violence. He does not think that the film is anti-Semitic, but it could stir anti-Semitism. Is it true that the Pope expressed support for the film? He wasn't there, of course, but as the Vatican has issued a denial, he assumes that the rumor is incorrect. As for the matter itself, the Church has repeatedly expressed its reservations about every form of anti-Semitism. Only last week, a joint statement about the film was published by the German bishops and Jewish leaders in Germany.
The recent wave of anti-Semitism disturbs him greatly. Not all of it comes from religious-conservative circles that have not adopted the Church's new approach; some of it comes, in fact, from the "progressive" left. So then it isn't the Church's problem? That is not what he said. Rome definitely sees itself as committed to the war on anti-Semitism. The Church is opposed to any form of racism, and the attacks on Jews and Judaism are worse than simple racism - they are equivalent to an attack on the Church itself, as Judaism is the mother of Christianity. Kasper recalls the Pope's visit to the synagogue in Rome in 1986, when John Paul II declared that "the Jewish religion is not external to us, but in a certain sense it is part of our religion. With Judaism we have a relationship that we have with no other religion. You are beloved brothers; it can even be said that you are our elder brothers."
Do the persecutions of the past also play a role in the Church's sense of responsibility? Kasper confirms this. Indeed, these things were already said at the Second Vatican Council. The Church acknowledges its part in the responsibility for the persecution of Jews and expresses remorse for the deeds of church people who were infected by hatred of Jews. And what should be done in practice, I ask. There are official statements, which clear the Jews of the murder of Christ and excoriate anti-Semitism as a sin against God and against humanity.
Education is more important, believes the cardinal. The Church is trying to spread the new views. He himself remembers how during his days as a bishop it was necessary to re-publish the religious manuals and the textbooks according to instructions from Rome. The Church is maintaining steady contact with Jewish leaders and organizations with the aim of tightening the ties of friendship and fighting anti-Semitism together. This Pope, he reiterates, is a true friend of the Jewish people, perhaps the best friend the Jews have ever had in the pontificate. He is right. However, it is worth noting that apart from John XXIII, he never had any rivals.
Not all the Jews
The Church's new approach to the Jews was officially born in the Nostra Aetate Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions of the Second Vatican Council. Vatican II, which was inaugurated by Pope John XXIII in 1962 and completed by Pope Paul VI in 1965, was a real revolution in Church's worldview. It reshaped the Church's outlook in a huge number of areas: from the Mass, which after 1,500 years returned to the vernacular instead of Latin; through the relinquishing of many of the external trappings of Church officials (the Council gave up the tonsure and allowed clerics and monks to wear everyday clothes, for example); to profound changes in the way the Church is run and its theological approach. Nostra Aetate was one of these changes. The declaration strongly denounced the persecution of the Jews and anti-Semitism, described the Jewish people in positive theological terms and removed from the Jews the blame for killing Christ. "The Jewish leadership and those who followed it," said the declaration, "did act to bring about Christ's end, but all Jews everywhere - among those who lived at that time and those who live today - must not be seen as to blame for the Passion." In these few words the Church turned its back on approximately 2,000 years of seeing the Jews as mainly responsible for the murder of the Messiah. Although Jews were responsible for his death, the Jews are not. This fateful "the" played a crucial role in the persecution of the Jews in Europe. Many of them paid with their blood for the spilled blood of their brother from Nazareth.
The problem with blaming the Jews for the Passion of Christ and for his death is that not only is it part of the Christian "oral law," it already appears in the "written law" - in the New Testament. It could be argued that the visual expression that Gibson gives to the Passion in his film is exaggerated, but the most problematic words in the film are taken from the Christian Scriptures themselves. The Jews in the New Testament cry "Crucify him! Crucify him!" The Jews pressure the hesitant Roman governor, who does not find Jesus at all guilty, to carry out the sentence, and the Jews declare: "His blood is upon us and upon our children." When Kasper says that the film is not anti-Semitic, he is expressing elliptically the dilemma that the Pope's spokesman, Father Joaquin Navarro-Valls, stated explicitly: If the film is anti-Semitic, then the Gospels are also anti-Semitic.
A Jew of course has no problem confirming both claims; for a Christian, this is difficult. If the Scriptures and church tradition represent the truth, then it is difficult to turn one's back on them. Eliminating the anti-Semitic elements from Catholicism is an extremely complicated surgical operation. The scalpel has to pass very close to essential organs. The hostility to Judaism is not a marginal matter in Christianity. It is at the very foundations of Christianity. It is necessary, without damaging the sanctity of the past and without casting doubt on the infallibility of the Scriptures, to change some of their basic assumptions. It is necessary to repress the anti-Semitism of the Books of the Gospels and of the Church fathers. This is not simple.
Christianity is a religion of continuity. It has chosen not to turn over a new leaf, but rather to overwrite the pages that have already been written about Judaism. This necessitates an explanation. Why prefer the rewrite over the original? Why prefer the younger brother over the elder brother? The answer is the profound moral and theological imperfection of the Jews. The Jews rejected Jesus out of hatred and malevolence and thus they lost their primogeniture. Because they rejected the savior and brought about his death, they were condemned to a life of wandering and humiliation. Their bitter fate has theological value. The Jews, as Saint Augustine made it clear in his treatise "Against the Jews," are living witnesses. They represent to everyone the price of rejecting the Messiah.
Not in front of the simple
To the Church it is clear that it was not about the Jews - the fleshly Israel, but rather about the Christian - the spiritual - Israel, that the Prophets preached. The scornful and hostile attitude toward the Jews was almost taken for granted by a devout Christian. Although the Church was opposed to violence toward them, its often limp reactions to outbursts of the mob testified that it had quite a lot of understanding for those who could not tolerate "the perfidious Jews," the enemies of the Messiah. Travel around Europe and see the manifestations of these perceptions everywhere: from the depictions of Synagoga (the personification of the synagogue) as a woman with a broken wand in her hand and a scarf covering her eyes, through monstrous depictions of Judaism in scenes of hatred, like that of the Santo Nino de la Guardia whom the dastardly Jews tortured in imitation of what their ancestors did to Christ.
How is it possible to turn one's back on the past without dangerously undermining the authority of the present? If all those people were wrong about such a fundamental matter, how do we know that they were not wrong about other matters and how do we know that the men of God are not wrong now?
The sagacity in the Church's minuet these days is to dance on tiptoe while trying not to tread on too many blisters. This requires tact and caution. There are things that it is better not to discuss. As far back as the 16th century, Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order, said in his treatise "How to Think with the Church" that while it is true, as the Protestants claim, that God pre-selected the elect, there are things that it is better not to talk about in front of "the simple people." The problem is that from time to time there are those who insist on behaving tactlessly - Mel Gibson, for example.
Gibson, who belongs to an extreme conservative Catholic faction that rejected Vatican II, insists on sticking to the plain, written word. This is a fundamentalist approach in its nature. It is not surprising that the film has won an enthusiastic response in the Bible Belt on the United States. The Catholics who are faithful to the Vatican, however, find themselves in a trap - if they deplore the film, they could look as though they are deploring the Scriptures; if they applaud it, they will be accused of anti-Semitism.
Therefore, they wave one hand, though it is not clear whether in protest or in applause. Mostly in perplexity. But the embarrassment does not testify to latent anti-Semitism. I tend to think that the Catholic Church really has given up anti-Semitism. There are instances of this disease here and there, but the Church has realized that it is possible, that it is better, without it. Beyond the psychological gains that have derived, or not derived, from the rejection of anti-Semitism, it also had a practical, political aspect. Vatican II was an expression of the Church's realization that the new world power with which it would have to live after the war was the Western democracies. Anti-Semitism had lost its "legitimacy" after the Holocaust. It gave off a sickening odor of Nazi concentration camps. The Church preferred to distance itself from this odor. Giving up anti-Semitism was a relatively cheap price for admittance into the club of the enlightened.
Absolute truth
This is not to say that the Church's Jewish problem has been solved to our satisfaction - the satisfaction of the Jews, that is. In the most profound sense, the Church continues to think that it alone is the Verus Israel - the real Israel. I asked Cardinal Kasper whether the Church continues to hold to "replacement theology" - the doctrine whereby the Church replaced the Jewish people as the chosen people because the Jews refused to accept Jesus. He was evasive. Replacement, he said, has never been an official part of Catholic doctrine. God does not break his promises, and the Old Testament was not denied by God.
This is not precisely accurate. The concept of replacement is not, perhaps, a concept that the Church uses, but the Church does see itself as the younger brother that has been given primogeniture. In 1985, the Pope clearly expressed the Church's position: "The Church, which is an expression of the New Testament, embodies the continuation of Israel that erred in search for salvation. The church is the new Israel because it lives according to the Divine Testament and not according to the Old Testament that led to the recognition of the One God, but did not bring with it redemption, which came from Christ the Savior." Thus Judaism played an important role in human history. At the end of days, when it finally accepts Jesus, it will win back its primogeniture and will once again be chosen. There do not exist two parallel sets of Divine promises - to the Jewish people and to the Church - nor do there exist parallel and equal paths to salvation.
When I asked Kasper for his opinion of the Church's 2000 declaration known as Jesus Dominus - only belief in the Holy Trinity and in Christ has the validity of absolute truth and only it leads to salvation - he replied that the declaration related to the non-Catholic churches. It deals with that as well, but it also deals with the exclusivity of the Catholic way. When I asked him directly whether someone who rejects Jesus can be saved, he replied in the negative. The Church believes that the prophecies were fulfilled in Jesus and that salvation is possible only through him. Wittingly or not, everyone who is saved is saved through Christ.
Truth to tell, this looks fair enough to me. It is not reasonable to demand of the Church that it adopt a relativist perception of the truth. The Dominus Jesus declaration comes out precisely against such a relativist approach. Anyone who believes in absolute truth cannot be a pluralist in the religious realm. Anti-pluralist outlooks are not popular these days. Church people who are asked to relate to the declaration are often evasive, on the grounds that Judaism is unlike other religions. This is correct only insofar as the Old Testament - at least the Christian interpretation of it - is absolute truth. However, Judaism is not the Old Testament and the rest of its sacred texts are no different in status from the texts of other religions. Possibly as a secular individual I would prefer a more egalitarian approach, but religious people do not relate to their beliefs as one possibility among many. They see them as absolute truth.
Does Judaism relate more openly to Christianity? I am not certain. Before you try to convince Rabbi Ovadia Yosef that Catholicism is a no less legitimate way to redemption than Judaism, try convincing him that it is not idol worship. Good luck. Until then, I'm prepared to make do with the reciprocal relinquishing of hatred and the categorical rejection of violence. This might not lead us to the kingdom of heaven, but here, on earth, it's no small thing.
Professor Aviad Kleinberg, a specialist in the history of Christianity, teaches in the history department at Tel Aviv University.
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