This post is part of Marc H. Ellis’s “Exile and the Prophetic” feature for Mondoweiss. To read the entire series visit the archive page.
I don’t know whether they’re voting today or tomorrow on the final revised document -“The Inheritance of Abraham? A Report on the Promised Land” – but since preemption is the talk of the town, I hereby declare victory whether the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland votes it up or down.
Ira Glunts has been on the Church of Scotland beat. He has already reported at least a rhetorical victory on the document that was assailed by the Jewish establishments in the United Kingdom, Israel and America. In sum, Glunts finds that the center did hold. Even with revisions, the report is a stunner.
While the Jewish establishments in the United Kingdom, Israel and the United States made their views known, using the usual anti-Semitism canard and threatening to break all sorts of relations, Jews of Conscience were actively whispering in the Church of Scotland ears. No doubt there are personal relationships that have grown up between church leaders and Jews of Conscience and, surprise, surprise, church leaders also read books and surf the net.
In print and on the ground, Jews of Conscience have been everywhere except the (traditional) halls of power. Evidently, a few have snuck in through the churches back door.
Here’s the rub though. The various Jewish establishments rely on threats and intimidation. Church folks are more and more educated on the Israel/Palestine issue. The Jewish establishments can’t afford to get educated; they’d have to abandon their position. Many in these churches are already beyond the sensibilities the document expresses.
If anyone thinks this is it for churches like the Church of Scotland, they’re wrong. More is coming down the pike.
A major reversal has occurred. Jewish leaders have an agenda and are, for the most part, ignorant of Israel/Palestine. They rely on the past history of anti-Semitism, the early days of Israel worship as repentance for the Holocaust and the Euro-American First World against the Arab Third World mentality. This past history is, well, passing, and even the latter white against people of color, Christian against Muslim which was revived in the post-September 11th era is now being renegotiated by Christians on the ground in different parts of the world.
What the Jewish establishments haven’t quite understood is that Christians are all over the world and that the churches in Europe and the United States have developed a global vision of justice and peace in the places where they first landed, conquered and destroyed the indigenous worlds they encountered.
I don’t romanticize the newly acquired justice vision of Christianity. This vision is covered with the blood of its own aggression. Nonetheless, Christianity’s empire conquering, with a change of view, has brought them into an active posture on behalf of those whom they conquered.
Whereas, Jews barely survived Christianity’s perennial assault, the Jewish establishments think they can join Christians as world conquerors. This, as many Christians relinquish their seat at the head table.
How does it feel to be on the wrong side of history? Christians know it. Muslims will awake to it. Jews are learning it.
You would think that the Jewish establishments, replete with such intelligent and worldly members, would change tact and reinvent themselves, if only to achieve their goals. Good leaders know goals change with time and circumstance. What once was achievable is possible no longer.
But the Jewish establishments have a major problem, Israel. Israel won’t let them go. Or they won’t let go of Israel. That is, Israel as it presents itself and Israel as the Jewish establishments envisions it.
Letting go of Israel, even in Israel itself, is a start on the road to recovery. After all, when you can’t let go, you have to start thinking of addiction.
Israel Christian Anonymous (ICA) – the number of Christian denominations confessing their addiction is growing.
“The Inheritance of Abraham” seeks high theological ground but perhaps it would have been better to simply start out: “My name is the Church of Scotland. I have been drunk on Israel for my own selfish reasons. I would like to share my story. I know it’s a day by day thing. I get sober, then I’m not….”
You write: “Jewish leaders have an agenda and are, for the most part, ignorant of Israel/Palestine.” A reflection on knowing and being ignorant is in order.
It may well be that Jewish leaders are for the most part ignorant, but this is not an innocent accident. It is not that they are just too busy to know about I/P. (They often have enough time to “know” about other places in the world where human rights violations are — so they often say — “worse” than in Israel and OPTs).
They appear to work under the burden of a “need to not know”, a required ignorance, and this leads to behavior which is indistinguishable — in practice — from knowing and concealing. When pro-Palestine folks say that Jewish leaders are lying, those leaders probably are lying — or got their information from someone who was lying.
We pro-P folks are so often called up as liars, etc., that the Ziobots seem to have teams of “knowers” or of people who pretend to be knowers, that is, the people who claim to detect pro-P “lies”.
So Jewish organizations seem to have people claiming to be knowers, and others acting as if they are non-knowers. Very interesting. I guess governments do this too, to establish “plausible denial”. But as a rule the denials (of knowledge) are not very plausible.
Marc,
Your Mondoweiss post is quoted in the revised edition of “The Inheritance of Abraham” in place of the deletion of some of Mark Braverman’s thoughts. Do you have any comment about that? It is a Marc for Mark, but they misspelled your name Mark.
The debate and vote on the Church and Society Council report, “The Inheritance of Abraham?” is scheduled for Thursday, May 23. According to the Church of Scotland press office, the report will be debated “around 12 noon” Scotland time. There is a 5 hours difference between Scottish and Eastern Standard time. So it should be sometime around 7 AM EST.
It will be webcast at: http://stream1.churchofscotland.org.uk/about_us/general_assembly/
Your Mondopost: https://mondoweiss.net/2012/11/exile-and-the-prophetic-the-interfaith-ecumenical-deal-is-dead.html
The revised report: http://www.churchofscotland.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/14050/The_Inheritance_of_Abraham.pdf
“would change tact and reinvent themselves”
Jewish establishments seem totally lacking in tact, so it would be difficult for them to change it. Perhaps they could change tack and acquire some.
More importantly, though, you are right. They need to break themselves from the Ziocane (c) addiction.
Where is Mooser when we need him?
“Where is Mooser when we need him?”
Not here, alas. Otherwise he would have rapped my knuckles for bad spelling.
Ziocaine.
Ziocaine.
Ziocaine.
Ziocaine.
Ziocaine.