Behold the Man – Jesus in Israeli Art: I Am Not Ashamed! – Part 1

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Part 1

I Am Not Ashamed

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The Apostle Paul says,

For I am not ashamed of the Good News, since it is God’s powerful means of bringing salvation to everyone who keeps on trusting, to the Jew especially, but equally to the Gentile

(CJB Romans 1.16).

It is my sincere appeal  to my fellow Jews that we need to not be ashamed of claiming Jesus/ Yeshua not only as part of Jewish cultural heritage, but equally as Messiah and Lord. It is very important that at the outset that we acknowledge that there are numerous barriers that have to be crossed in this endeavour to discover the Jewish Jesus.

How utterly amazing and courageous of Amitai Mendelsohn to have produce this amazing exhibition about Jewish and Israeli artists who have dared to portray Jesus in their artistic creations and face the potential criticism and rejection for doing so.

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Behold the Man: Jesus in Israeli Art 

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The Attempted Suppression of the Visual Portrayal of Jesus in Israeli Art

During our visit to Israel in April-May 2019 in my pursuit of to discover paintings and sculptures of Jesus I encountered what I perceive as a deliberate attempt to suppress and hide any portrayal. This is despite the most amazing show of Jesus in Jesus in Israeli Art.

Israel Museum, Jerusalem

While visiting the gallery that had this painting by Reuven Rubin in which one of the central figures is the woman beside a man holding fruit and a vegetable resembles a fertility goddess.

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Museum:The Israel Museum, Jerusalem 

Artist / Creator:

Rubin, Reuven, Israeli, born Romania, 1893-1974

Description…

“. . . sunshine, the sea, the halutzim (pioneers) with their bronzed faces and open shirts, the Yemenite girls, and children with enormous eyes. A new country, a new life was springing up around me” (Reuven Rubin, My Life, My Art) First Fruits was painted by Reuven Rubin, one of the country’s best known artists, during his first year in Palestine. For Rubin the Land of Israel was an Oriental paradise, a place of harmony and fertility – the perfect setting for the birth of a new kind of Jew and the shaping of a native Israeli identity. The triptych format, often used for church altarpieces, endows the work with a certain sanctity and solemnity. The central panel contains an updated, allegorical depiction of the ritual offering of the first fruits. The figures symbolize different local types. The brawny Atlas-like farmer with a watermelon on his back is the pioneer, emblem of the New Hebrew who is in touch with nature. The woman beside him resembles a fertility goddess. The Yemenite couple represents Jews of the Orient who carry on the age-old, devout way of life. Modest and traditional, they lack the confident physicality of the other couple; the offering they bear is their child, the fruit of their loins. The Arabs in the two side panels are essentially part of the landscape: secondary characters in this drama, they do not participate in the productive work that drives the world.
The woman beside him resembles a fertility goddess and is not to be confused with a number of other paintings by Reuven Rubin of the Modonna and Child. In these other paintings the Virgin Mary and images of the infant Jesus are clearly depicted. Ruben is unequivocal in both his portrayal and intension in these explicit painting of Jesus and his mother. Themes of rebirth of hope and also the rebirth of the Jewish people to the land of Israel are the intended message.
The difficulty that arises is not with the artist and his portrayal, but rather with the Israeli viewer and the struggle that incurs through the rendition of such explicitly Christian/ Messianic imagery.

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Madonna with Pomegranates,

1960

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Madonna with Child 

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The Madonna of the Vagabonds

The Madonna of the Vagabonds, painted in Bucharest the year before Rubin left for Palestine, suggests an analogy between the infant Jesus and the pioneer reborn in the Land of Israel. With its brighter palette, the painting heralds Rubin’s new Land-of-Israel style and reflects the optimism he experienced on the eve of his immigration.

The hopeful light of dawn illuminates the scene. In the background is the Sea of Galilee, upon which Jesus is said to have walked and where he gathered many of his disciples, simple fisherman. Three empty boats float on the water, presumably belonging to the men asleep on the shore and about to awake to a new era of redemption. These are the “vagabonds” who arrived at this shore at the beginning of the 20th century to be pioneers in the old-new land.

The Madonna looks down at the infant, not in the adoring pose of many traditional Christian depictions that show her venerating the baby Jesus, but with her bared breast emphasizing her fecundity and a smile on her lips. The fact that she is seated solidly on the ground conveys simplicity and rootedness. In composition, the painting closely resembles the earlier Temptation in the Desert, but this mother is the antithesis of a femme fatale, and the work’s message is entirely different. Instead of sexual repulsion, asceticism and anguish, the Madonna of the Vagabonds and her baby signal fertility, the renewal of nature, and the advent of redemption.

ראובן רובין, ישראלי (יליד רומניה), 1974-1893 המדונה של חסרי הבית, 1922 צבעי-שמן על בד מוזיאון בית ראובן, תל-אביב

Reuven Rubin, The Madonna of the Vagabonds, 1922
Oil on canvas
Rubin Museum, Tel Aviv

A response by one the staff on duty at the Rubin Museum in Tel Aviv

When I questioned him about the overtly Christian symbolism depicted in some of Rubin’s paintings, he was rather dismissive and said that one can read into the artist’s work whatever you like. He implied that if you want to see Christian symbolism in these paintings that is one’s own choice, but it is no necessarily what Rubin may have explicitly intended. While his response was not a flat denial, he did not appear to readily embrace a messianic inclination in interpreting Rubin’s work when he dealt with images of Jesus and other New Testament themes.

However…

How Jewish Artists Reclaimed Jesus as Their Own

Though Jesus has traditionally been a taboo subject among observant Jews, he has served as a common theme for modern Jewish painters and writers. Now the Israel Museum is devoting an exhibition to portraying the way local artists have engaged in dialogue with ‘that person’.

Man of Sorrows and Zionist Messiah: Reuven Rubin

“The nails in Jesus’ hands and feet are those that burn me, and no one can comprehend my suffering.” (Reuven Rubin, 1922)

Rubin_art-station-jewish-art

The work of Reuven Rubin became synonymous with what is known as Land-of-Israel Zionist art, but Christian themes played a role in the paintings Reuven Rubin created in Europe and also after his arrival in Palestine in 1923. On a personal level, he identified with Jesus, regarding him as a misunderstood, persecuted spiritual figure. In a national context, he saw Jesus as a symbol of the exile the Jews needed to leave behind in order to achieve self-fulfillment and regeneration – and also, unusually, as an image of Zionist rebirth. Marc Chagall likewise regarded Jesus as an alter ego and as a symbol of Jewish suffering, but Reuven was the first to connect the figure of Jesus to that of the New Jew and the pioneers living in their homeland after two thousand years of exile.

Self-Portrait with Flower

Shortly after arriving in the Land of Israel, Rubin paints himself in the white shirt of a pioneer, seated against a characteristic background: sand dunes, three tents, two houses, and a corner of the sea with a boat. His right hand clutches a fistful of paintbrushes, while his left holds a glass containing a white lily. Also known as a Madonna Lily, this flower is familiar from depictions of the Annunciation: it is the attribute, the distinguishing symbol, of Mary. Just as saints were portrayed in Christian art holding their attributes, Rubin’s paintbrushes identify him as an artist. The lily also suggests that he sees himself as the bearer of glad tidings, perhaps even as a messiah of Zionist painting in the land. His mission: to herald – and to create – a newborn art that will accompany the momentous change occurring in the life of the Jewish people.

ראובן רובין, ישראלי (יליד רומניה), 1974-1893 דיוקן עצמי עם פרח, 1923 צבעי-שמן על בד מוזיאון בית ראובן, תל-אביב Reuven Rubin, Self-Portrait with Flower, 1923
Oil on canvas
Rubin Museum, Tel Aviv

Temptation in the Desert 

“That figure in the middle is myself . . . resisting temptation, continuing on my way of suffering in spite of the hands that reach out to grasp me. . . . she [the woman] is trying to hold me back, but I am (going on. I shall go on!)” (Reuven Rubin, 1918)

This key early painting by Rubin (born Romania, 1893–1974) brings to mind two New Testament stories that had become popular subjects in Christian art: Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane immediately before his arrest (the Agony in the Garden) and his encounter with Mary Magdalene after rising from the tomb, when he warns her not to touch him (Noli me tangere). In Rubin’s portrayal of the confrontation with worldly temptation – the title also refers to a third episode in the life of Jesus, the Temptation in the Desert – a poignant image of personal supplication is joined to defiance of a woman who evokes the seductive femme fatale.

Although not an overt self-portrait, Rubin did tell an interviewer that he modeled the face of the central figure after his brother, who died during World War I, but also saw himself in the tortured ascetic. Thus the painting can be considered a rare early example of a Jewish artist daring to identify with Jesus.

 מתנת קיי לי ווירייז' גאן, דאלאס, באמצעות ידידי המוזיאון בארה"ב

Reuven Rubin, Temptation in the Desert, 1921
Oil on canvas
Tel Aviv Museum of Art, gift of Kaye Lee Wrage Gunn, Dallas, to the American Friends of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art

The Encounter 

The Encounter is one of the most intriguing and enigmatic of Rubin’s early works. A weary elderly Jew sits, head bowed, at one end of the bench. At the other end sits Jesus with his stigmata; he has been crucified, but now he is resurrected and sits upright. This encounter suggests the legend of the weary Wandering Jew, punished with eternal homelessness for his taunting of Christ.

A tree with drooping branches stands beside the old, bent Jew, while a burgeoning tree grows upward next to Jesus. The visual juxtaposition of defeated Judaism and triumphant Christianity echoes the longstanding motif of Ecclesia (the Church) overcoming Synagoga – but here the meaning is quite different. Early-20th-century Zionist imagery contrasted the withered past with the fertile growth of a new era; in this painting, Rubin may also be suggesting a more daring symbolic analogy between the Zionist movement’s mission to bring the Jewish people back to life and Jesus risen from the dead.

ראובן רובין, ישראלי (יליד רומניה), 1974-1893 הפגישה (ישו והיהודי), 1922  צבעי-שמן על בד אוסף הפניקס, חברה לביטוח בע"מ, תל-אביב
Reuven Rubin, The Encounter (Jesus and the Jew), 1922
Oil on canvas
Collection of the Phoenix Insurance Company Ltd., Tel Aviv

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Moshe Castel

Moshe Elazar Castel born in Jerusalem, Ottoman Palestine, in 1909, to Rabbi Yehuda Castel and his wife Rachel. The family was descended from Spanish Jews from Castile who immigrated to the Holy Land after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492. His father was born in Hebron. He opened religious schools for Sephardi boys in the Nahalat Shiv’a and Bukharim quarters of Jerusalem. Moshe grew up in the Bukharim neighborhood, where he attended his father’s school. At the age of 13, he was accepted to the Bezalel Art School, directed by Boris Schatz, where he studied from 1921 to 1925. His teacher, Shmuel Ben David, encouraged him to study art in Paris.

Castel traveled to Paris in 1927, where he attended Académie Julian and Ecole du Louvre. He sat in the Louvre copying the works of Rembrandt, Velasquez, Delacroix and Courbet, intrigued by their paint-layering techniques.[1] It was here that he began to realize that “art is not symbolic, but rather material, the material is the main thing, the way the paint is placed, the way the layers are placed on the picture, this is the most essential thing.” [1]

In May 1927, the World Union of Hebrew Youth in Paris sponsored his first exhibit. Ze’ev Jabotinsky, who was in Paris at the time, wrote an introduction for the catalogue.[1]

In 1940, Castel returned to Palestine and settled in Safed.[2] In 1949, Castel married Bilhah (née Bauman), an actress.

Artistic career

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Moshe Castel

 

In 1947, Castel helped to found the “New Horizons” (Ofakim Hadashim) group together with Yosef Zaritsky, Yehezkel Streichman, Marcel Janco and others. In 1959, he purchased a studio in Montparnasse where he worked for several months a year. In 1955, a solo exhibition of his works was mounted at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. His murals hang in the Knesset, Binyanei HaUma Convention Center, Rockefeller Center in New York, and the official residence of the President of Israel in Jerusalem.[2]

Style

In the 1930s and 1940s, many of Castel’s paintings depicted the lives of Sephardic Jews in the Holy Land, revealing the influence of Persian miniatures.[3] From the 1950s on, Castel created relief paintings inspired by the “ancient predecessors of Hebrew civilization.” In 1948, he visited the ruins of an ancient synagogue in Korazin, an ancient Jewish town in the Galilee.[4] Inspired by the basalt blocks he saw there, engraved with images and ornaments, he began to use ground basalt, which he molded into shapes, as his basic material.[5] The technique utilized ground basalt rock mixed with sand and glue, infused with the rich colors that became his trademark.[3] The works were embellished with archaic forms derived from ancient script, symbolism and mythological signs from Hebrew and Sumerian culture.[5] As a member of the New Horizons group, he combined elements of abstract European art with Eastern motifs and “Canaanite art.”[6]

Moshe Castel, Untitled (The Crucified)

 “. . . Jesus cried with a loud voice, ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabakhtani?’ that is, ‘My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?’” (Matthew 27:46)

The story behind this dark crucifixion by Moshe Castel (1909–1991), a painter known for his depictions of Jewish religious and national subjects, must be sought in Castel’s personal history. The work was created when the artist secluded himself in a monastery near the Sea of Galilee in order to recover from the loss of his first wife, who died in childbirth, and the death of their daughter three years later. Discovered in a locked cupboard in Castel’s house in 1992, the painting – which is highly unusual in the context of his work and that of his Israeli contemporaries – is now displayed to the public for the first time.

In an expressive style influenced by Chaim Soutine, and inspired by Marc Chagall’s crucifixions, Castel put himself on the cross. The face is a self-portrait, while above the figure a Hebrew inscription says “Castel the Jew,” so that the artist’s intense outpouring of pain culminates in total identification with the suffering of the crucified Christ.

In two sketches from the same period, the Hebrew inscriptions above the figure read “Jesus” and “Jesus of Nazareth.” They give the full name Yeshu’a rather than the more common Yeshu, which was often read derisively by Jews as an acronym for “may his name be obliterated,” and may indicate the painter’s rejection of this traditional revulsion and his own positive perception of Jesus.

משה קסטל, ישראלי, 1991-1909 בלי כותרת (הצלוב), שנות ה-40 של המאה ה-20 צבעי-שמן על בד מוזיאון משה קסטל, מעלה אדומים

Moshe Castel, Untitled (The Crucified), 1940s
Oil on canvas
Moshe Castel Museum of Art, Ma’ale Adumim

Once more…

While staying in Ma’ale Adumim I was able to visit the Moshe Castel Museum of Art a number of times. When I enquire as to where Castel’s explicitly Christian paintings once more I met some vague explination that these pieces of his work were not available for viewing at that time.

For just as these crucifixion paintings and drawings by Castel had been locked away in a cupboard until after Moshe Castle’s death, so once more these pieces of work were hidden from view.


The Figure of Jesus in Jewish Art

ישו היהודי

View of the gallery

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Maurycy Gottlieb, Christ  Teaching in Capernaum

“How deeply I wish to eradicate all the prejudices against my people . . . and to bring peace between the Poles and the Jews, for the history of both people is a chronicle of grief and anguish!” (Maurycy Gottlieb, 1879)

Maurycy Gottlieb (born Galicia, 1856–1879) may well have been the most important Jewish painter of the nineteenth century. During his short lifetime, he created a body of work that joined Polish Christian culture to his own Jewish identity in a search for reconciliation.

Christ Teaching in Capernaum shows Jesus standing in the pulpit of a synagogue built in Greco-Roman style. His body is wrapped in a prayer shawl, but his head is surrounded by the halo from Christian artistic tradition. Not all of the men and women listening to him appear to be Jewish; a man in light-colored Roman garb is particularly noticeable. The young Jew in the foreground, lost in thought with his hands on his knees, is a self-portrait of the artist.

Gottlieb’s approach clearly derives from the Jewish enlightenment view that Jesus was a great ethical teacher who never intended to abandon his own religion. The message preached by his Jesus seeks to overcome antagonism between Judaism and Christianity and hence between Jews and Poles in the artist’s own society. Gottlieb does not advocate embracing the Christian Savior, but rather returning to the authentic roots of religion, to its universal teaching of truth and love.

 מתנת יוסף שטיגליץ, תל-אביב B86.0290

Maurycy Gottlieb, Christ before His Judges, 1877–79
Oil on canvas

Samuel Hirszenberg, The Wandering Jew 

This monumental painting by Samuel Hirszenberg, (born Poland, 1865–1908) whose artistic career coincided with a period of violent anti-Semitic persecution in Eastern Europe, became a symbol of Jewish suffering in the shadow of the cross. A powerful image for those who believed that Jews’ misery would only come to an end with the creation of a national home in the Land of Israel, it was prominently displayed for many years in Jerusalem’s Bezalel Museum.

The painting’s subject is the Wandering Jew, the figure of Christian legend who taunted Jesus on his way to Calvary and as a result was condemned to wander the earth until the end of time. However, in contrast to the dark robes worn by the Jew in traditional depictions, only a loincloth covers the naked man portrayed by Hirszenberg, recalling Jesus on the cross. The image of the cursed Jew has been joined to that of his arch-enemy in a nightmarish scenario which suggests that the Jews will only find rest after they have escaped the shadow of the cross.

 מתנת האמן B04139

Samuel Hirszenberg, The Wandering Jew (or The Eternal Jew),
1899
Oil on canvas

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Jewish Word – The Wandering Jew

A legendary curse, revisited

September 23, 2019

This piece originally appeared in Moment in 2010.

Every autumn, Jews all over the world read the Torah portion Lech Lecha, in which God instructs the future patriarch Abraham to abandon his native land for a promised one. In exchange, God vows to make Abraham’s name great and to create a mighty nation out of his descendants. But the 75-year-old isn’t all that pleased when he winds up in Beersheba, a sandy city in the desert prone to famine. Before long, the first Wandering Jew is on the road again, headed to Egypt in search of food.

Be they refugees, merchants or tourists, Jews have been wandering for more than 3,000 years. Yet surprisingly, the origin of the phrase Wandering Jew has little to do with peripatetic Semites. Instead, it harks back to a fictitious—and anti-Semitic—legend that arose in late antiquity.

Sometime between the 3rd and 7th centuries, a story began circulating about a Jew who had refused to allow Jesus to lean against the wall of his house as he carried the cross to the crucifixion, according to Galit Hasan-Rokem, professor of folklore at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In later versions, the Jew is said to verbally assault Jesus or even strike him. Whatever the details, says Hasan-Rokem, in each telling the Jew “was cursed by Jesus to wander until the Second Coming.”

Although it first emerged in written form in 13th-century Italy, the tale didn’t become popular until 1602, when it was recorded in a German book, A Brief Description and Narrative Regarding a Jew Named Ahasuerus. The author asserted that the bishop of a town called Schleswig had encountered a Jew named Ahasuerus in Hamburg in the 1540s; Ahasuerus told the bishop that he had been wandering aimlessly for well over 1,000 years.

The book became a bestseller with more than 80 printings over the next century—“like an Oprah’s pick, back when there wasn’t much to pick from,” says Joanna Brichetto, who wrote her master’s thesis at Vanderbilt University on images of the Wandering Jew. Soon the Wandering Jew was featured prominently in English, French and Finnish ballads and even crept into literature and art.

“And here am I a-walkin’ about like the wanderin’ Jew—a sportin’ character you have perhaps heerd on,” wrote Charles Dickens in his serial 1836-37 novel The Pickwick Papers. Twenty years later, the French artist Gustave Doré illustrated Pierre-Jean de Béranger’s “La Légende du Juif Errant”—images that Brichetto calls the “definitive representation of the anti-Jewish Wandering Jew.” By the end of the 19th century, “all of Europe…was on a first-name basis with Ahasuerus,” she wrote in her thesis. He was generally portrayed as devilish and money-grubbing; he bore a facial blemish and a heavy, tangled beard, and was equipped with a walking stick and purse.

Serving as “a common target for any and all Judenhass [Jew hatred],” Ahasuerus “enjoyed a burst of popularity” between 1890 and 1920 in Germany, says Brichetto. Der Ewige Jude—the Eternal Jew—as the Germans called him, “was as likely to turn up in a third-rate novella as in a satirical cartoon or political diatribe.”

At the same time, Jews—largely in response to the racism—began to claim the Wandering Jew as their own. In certain circles, Hasan-Rokem explains, he had already become “identified with the positive values of individualism, rebellion against religious authorities and authority in general.” Hasan-Rokem offers the example of James Joyce’s Ulysses, which “combines Europe’s two great wanderers: Odysseus and the Wandering Jew.”

Jewish painters such as Marc Chagall and Samuel Hirszenberg, too, were drawn to the character. In 1899, Hirszenberg painted his Wandering Jew, an apocalyptic image in which a Jesus-like figure is represented as “a desperate, old Polish Jew whose suffering saves no one,” says Brichetto. Chagall’s Jews came to represent “the quintessential Wandering Jews of the 20th century, reflecting political and existential exile.”

Not surprisingly, Nazis resurrected the Wandering Jew to portray Jews as cultural parasites whose values and character traits ran counter to the Aryan ideal. But although the figure continues to function as a catalyst of hate, appearing, for example, on neo-Nazi websites, its original meaning has begun to recede into history. A wanderer, after all, is not necessarily a negative thing or even uniquely Jewish. “There is no single archetypal figure,” says Jay Geller, professor of modern Jewish culture at Vanderbilt University, who explains that there are also non-Jewish variants such as the Flying Dutchman and the Ancient Mariner.

Today the term is popular with Jewish travelers and travel writers, which Brichetto applauds. She believes it’s important for Jews to continue to imbue the Wandering Jew with positive meanings in order to counter its ugly past. “We should use it,” says Brichetto, “but we should always question it: Who is using the term and why?”


From Personal Experience to National Identity: 1930’s-1960’s


Leopold Krakauer, Jesus/Tree

The “Jesus/Tree” series by Leopold Krakauer (1890–1954) reveals a complex relationship between this architect-artist from Vienna and the landscape in which the story of Jesus is set. Against dark, turbulent backgrounds, the olive tree, a symbol of the East, is fused with the figure of Jesus – who became a Western symbol, but whose roots likewise lie in the East. The first work in the series dates back to 1927, three years after Krakauer’s arrival, while the final drawings are from 1940–41.

Living in Jerusalem, Krakauer was inspired by its olive trees, including those in the Valley of the Cross, where, according to Christian tradition, the Romans cut down the tree from which they fashioned the cross. But his bleak depictions lack the hope for salvation that Christianity associates with the crucifixion: although an instrument of death, the cross symbolizes life and atonement for the Original Sin of having eaten from the Tree of Knowledge. That comfort is lacking here. Adapting to his new environment and presumably influenced by the troubled events of his time, Krakauer evokes the suffering of Jesus in portrayals of an anguished Jerusalem landscape.

“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:10)

 שאילה ארוכת-טווח מאת טרודה דותן, ירושלים L-B13.0007

Leopold Krakauer, Jesus Tree, 1949
Chalk on paper
The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Extended loan from Trude Dothan, Jerusalem
leopold-krakauer-olive-tree-in-the-landscape.jpg

Leopold Krakauer

Olive Tree in the landscape

Sale Date: June 1, 2006

Jesus-dark tree_2

Leopold Krakauer

Jesus/Dark tree, 1927

Cursed is every man/one that hangeth on the tree

“And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree: His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God) that thy land be not defiled, which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.”

– Deuteronomy 21v22-23

“Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:”

– Galatians 3v13

“If any man has committed a sin worthy of death, let him be hanged on a tree…Christ became a curse for us…cursed is everyone that hangs on a tree.”

What an amazing incident from Scripture. This passage from the law tells that those who have committed a sin worthy of death were to be hanged on a tree. Crucifixion, the Roman method of execution was unknown at the time. Here was prophesied one of the most dramatic aspects of the death of Christ for us.

Those who were to be hung on a tree were accursed, guilty of a sin worthy of death. Jesus was deserving on neither of these. Yet, He was hung on a tree, cursed and seemingly guilty.

It is almost beyond our comprehension what had to happen for Jesus to find Himself on the cross. Jesus had to take all of our guilt on Himself, becoming accursed for us and bearing our curse on the cross. The One who committed no sin worthy of death hung on the cross for all who do commit sin worthy of death. This is the epitome of love!

Praise God that Jesus took my place on the tree. May I live a life of gratitude to me!

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Naas Preacher

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The Image of the Cursed Tree

Jesus-dark tree-3

One of the ways that the Romans  crucified their victims was to strip the branches of an olive tree and impale the body on it by stretching out the arms and attaching them to part of the tree. This concept fits in perfectly with Leopold Krakauer visual interpretation of the crucifixion of Jesus.

The prophet Isaiah say,

Isaiah 53:5 New King James Version (NKJV) 

5 But He was wounded[1] for our transgressions,
He was [2]bruised for our iniquities;
The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,
And by His stripes[3] we are healed.

Footnotes:

  1. Isaiah 53:5 Or pierced through
  2. Isaiah 53:5 crushed
  3. Isaiah 53:5 Blows that cut in

If Jesus did this for us, then how should we respond?

We should not be ashamed whether we are Jewish or Gentile to bow  the knee and embrace him as Lord and Messiah:

What is the sinner’s prayer?

The sinners prayer is a Christian term for a prayer that is said when someone wants to repent of their sin, ask God for forgiveness and state belief in the life, death, and saving resurrection of Jesus Christ. Romans 10:9-10 says that “if you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.  For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.”

Millions of people world-wide have come to a saving relationship with God through Yeshua the Messiah. He is the only true mediator between God and humankind. We are saved not by saying a prayer but rather through repentance and faith that lies behind the prayers that we say.

Here is an example of the sinners prayer that you can address to God in prayer:

A Sinner’s Prayer

Lord Yeshua/ Jesus, I thank you that you are the way, the truth and the life. I invite you to come into my life and save and deliver me from sin and death. I open the door of my heart/ life and by faith I gratefully receive your gift of salvation.I want to trust you as my Lord and Savior. I believe you are the Messiah of Israel and Saviour of the world who died on the cursed tree/ cross and that you cancelled the debt of my sins. Thank you that you are a living Saviour and that you are offering me the gift of eternal life. Come into my heart, Lord Yeshua/ Jesus, and be my Savior. Amen. 

 


 

ם בְּבֵית תְּפִלָּתִי עוֹלֹתֵיהֶם וְזִבְחֵיהֶם לְרָצוֹן עַל מִזְבְּחִי כִּי בֵיתִי בֵּית תְּפִלָּה יִקָּרֵא לְכָל הָעַמִּים

“I will bring them to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon my altar; for my house shall be called, a house of prayer for all people” Isaiah 56:7

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‘Born Again’ – Born Anew: Roni Speaks to Karen Gil in Nahariya, Israel

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What does it mean to be Born Again?

Roni interviews Karen Gil about her experience  of coming to faith and what it means for a Jewish person to be ‘Born Again.’

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While Karen is Jewish the same principles of how to become a believer applies universally to Jews and Gentiles alike – God is the God not only of the Jews but also the Gentiles.

Roni also dispels some popular misconceptions about Zionism and explains that Zionism is a bona fida expression of Jewish Nationalism and that the UN Resolution 3379 passed in November 1974 by the UN General Assembly was a travesty and motivated by those who hate Israel and the Jewish people.

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A Visit to Fareed: A Most Interesting Conversation About Life In Israel, United Kingdom & Finland in 2019

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Jews, Arabs, Israelis and Palestinians,  – Jews,  Christians, Moslems, Druze and the Gospel

Roni and Elisheva together with Karen Gil visit an Arab Christian couple Fareed and Samya in their home in Haifa and speak about life in Israel today.

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You May also enjoy listening to:

Ruth’s Story – Home Coming & Return

 

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Armenian Genocide

Listen Now:

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During My Recent Visit to Israel

I had the opportunity to interview a descendant of the Armenian Genocide living in Israel and Pierre Altounian tells his story.

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“Genocide” is a term used to describe violence against members of a national, ethnic, racial or religious group with the intent to destroy the entire group. The word came into general usage only after World War II, when the full extent of the atrocities committed by the Nazi …read more

 

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In spite of these obstacles, the Armenian community thrived under Ottoman rule. They tended to be better educated and wealthier than their Turkish neighbors, who in turn grew to resent their success.

This resentment was compounded by suspicions that the Christian Armenians would be more loyal to Christian governments (that of the Russians, for example, who shared an unstable border with Turkey) than they were to the Ottoman caliphate.

These suspicions grew more acute as the Ottoman Empire crumbled. At the end of the 19th century, the despotic Turkish Sultan Abdul Hamid II – obsessed with loyalty above all, and infuriated by the nascent Armenian campaign to win basic civil rights – declared that he would solve the “Armenian question” once and for all.

“I will soon settle those Armenians,” he told a reporter in 1890. “I will give them a box on the ear which will make them…relinquish their revolutionary ambitions.”

The First Armenian Massacre

Between 1894 and 1896, this “box on the ear” took the form of a state-sanctioned pogrom.

In response to large scale protests by Armenians, Turkish military officials, soldiers and ordinary men sacked Armenian villages and cities and massacred their citizens. Hundreds of thousands of Armenians were murdered.

Young Turks

In 1908, a new government came to power in Turkey. A group of reformers who called themselves the “Young Turks” overthrew Sultan Abdul Hamid and established a more modern constitutional government.

At first, the Armenians were hopeful that they would have an equal place in this new state, but they soon learned that what the nationalistic Young Turks wanted most of all was to “Turkify” the empire. According to this way of thinking, non-Turks – and especially Christian non-Turks – were a grave threat to the new state.

World War I Begins

In 1914, the Turks entered World War I on the side of Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. (At the same time, Ottoman religious authorities declared a holy war against all Christians except their allies.)

Military leaders began to argue that the Armenians were traitors: If they thought they could win independence if the Allies were victorious, this argument went, the Armenians would be eager to fight for the enemy.

As the war intensified, Armenians organized volunteer battalions to help the Russian army fight against the Turks in the Caucasus region. These events, and general Turkish suspicion of the Armenian people, led the Turkish government to push for the “removal” of the Armenians from the war zones along the Eastern Front.

Armenian Genocide Begins

On April 24, 1915, the Armenian genocide began. That day, the Turkish government arrested and executed several hundred Armenian intellectuals.

After that, ordinary Armenians were turned out of their homes and sent on death marches through the Mesopotamian desert without food or water.

Frequently, the marchers were stripped naked and forced to walk under the scorching sun until they dropped dead. People who stopped to rest were shot.

At the same time, the Young Turks created a “Special Organization,” which in turn organized “killing squads” or “butcher battalions” to carry out, as one officer put it, “the liquidation of the Christian elements.”

These killing squads were often made up of murderers and other ex-convicts. They drowned people in rivers, threw them off cliffs, crucified them and burned them alive. In short order, the Turkish countryside was littered with Armenian corpses.

Records show that during this “Turkification” campaign, government squads also kidnapped children, converted them to Islam and gave them to Turkish families. In some places, they raped women and forced them to join Turkish “harems” or serve as slaves. Muslim families moved into the homes of deported Armenians and seized their property.

Though reports vary, most sources agree that there were about 2 million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire at the time of the massacre. In 1922, when the genocide was over, there were just 388,000 Armenians remaining in the Ottoman Empire.

Armenian Genocide Today

After the Ottomans surrendered in 1918, the leaders of the Young Turks fled to Germany, which promised not to prosecute them for the genocide. (However, a group of Armenian nationalists devised a plan, known as Operation Nemesis, to track down and assassinate the leaders of the genocide.)

Ever since then, the Turkish government has denied that a genocide took place. The Armenians were an enemy force, they argue, and their slaughter was a necessary war measure.

Today, Turkey is an important ally of the United States and other Western nations, and so their governments have likewise been reluctant to condemn the long-ago killings. In March 2010, a U.S. Congressional panel at last voted to recognize the genocide.

However, little has changed in Turkey: Despite pressure from Armenians and social justice advocates throughout the world, it’s still illegal in Turkey to talk about what happened to Armenians during that era.

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Bosnian Genocide

In April 1992, the government of the Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina declared its independence from Yugoslavia. Over the next several years, Bosnian Serb forces, with the backing of the Serb-dominated Yugoslav army, perpetrated atrocious crimes against Bosniak (Bosnian …read more

 

Members from the 501st Transportation Squadron, Kaiserslautern Germany, and C Company, 3rd Battalion, 325th Infantry Brigade (Airborne Combat Team, (ABCT)), Southern European Task Force (SETAF), Vicenza, Italy, and the Task Force 51, Mannheim Germany, bring a convoy of fresh water.  The water was made by eight chlorinators and two reverse osmosis machines in Goma for Rwandan refugees located at Camp Kimbumba, Zaire.

Rwandan Genocide

During the Rwandan genocide of 1994, members of the Hutu ethnic majority in the east-central African nation of Rwanda murdered as many as 800,000 people, mostly of the Tutsi minority. Started by Hutu nationalists in the capital of Kigali, the genocide spread throughout the …read more

 

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Battle of Gallipoli

The Gallipoli Campaign of 1915-16, also known as the Battle of Gallipoli or the Dardanelles Campaign, was an unsuccessful attempt by the Allied Powers to control the sea route from Europe to Russia during World War I. The campaign began with a failed naval attack by British and …read more

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California’s Little-Known Genocide

“Gold! Gold from the American River!” Samuel Brannan walked up and down the streets of San Francisco, holding up a bottle of pure gold dust. His triumphantannouncement, and the discovery of gold at nearby Sutter’s Mill in 1848, ushered in a new era for California—one in which …read more

 

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Dardanelles Campaign

In March 1915, during World War I (1914-18), British and French forces launched an ill-fated naval attack on Turkish forces in the Dardanelles in northwestern Turkey, hoping to take control of the strategically vital strait separating Europe from Asia. The failure of the …read more

 

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World War I

World War I began in 1914, after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and lasted until 1918. During the conflict, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire (the Central Powers) fought against Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy, Romania, Japan and the …read more

Outbreak of World War I

Europe by 1914 Almost exactly a century before, a meeting of the European states at the Congress of Vienna had established an international order and balance of power that lasted for almost a century. By 1914, however, a multitude of forces were threatening to tear it apart. The …read more

 

TURKEY – CIRCA 2002:  Mustafa Kemal, known as Ataturk, in the uniform of a sergeant of the army. Turkey, 20th century (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images)

Kemal Atatürk

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (1881-1938) was an army officer who founded an independent Republic of Turkey out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. He then served as Turkey’s first president from 1923 until his death in 1938, implementing reforms that rapidly secularized and westernized …read more

Jesus Comes Back to the Jews: Part 1

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From December, 2016 at the Israel Museum an exhibit, Jesus comes back to the Jews, was boldly featured by the museum’s art curator, Amatai Mendelsohn. The exhibit featured 150 works by 40 mainly Jewish artists exploring the complex, evolving attitudes of Jewish, Zionist and Israeli artists toward the Christian Saviour. The exhibition concluded on the 22nd April, 2017. A companion book called: Behold the Man: Jesus in Israeli Art, was written by Amatai Mendelsohn. 

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[By JESSICA STEINBERG 23 January 2017, 12:13 pm]

 

Last supperAdi Nes’s ‘Untitled (Last Supper), planned down to the last plate (Courtesy Israel Museum)

Ms Jessica Steinberg said,

“Jesus and the Jews have had something of a complicated relationship.”

In “Behold The Man: Jesus in Israeli Art,” a new exhibit at the Israel Museum, curator Amatai Mendelsohn examines that complex iconography up close, through the prism of Jewish and Israeli art.

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It’s a process Mr Mendelsohn began 10 years ago, when he first laid eyes on an unusual painting by Reuven Rubin, the famed Israeli artist and pioneer. (You may view my programme in Behold the Man series in which I feature Rubin’s work0.

At the time, Mendelsohn was working on an exhibit about Rubin, “Prophets and Visionaries: Reuven Rubin’s Early Years: 1914-23,” and stumbled upon one of Rubin’s earliest self-portraits, in which he mimics aspects of a Jesus figure, as he, the subject, stares down at his bloodied hands.

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“Rubin was attracted to Jesus, and that intrigued me,” he said. “Now I know how many Jewish artists dealt with the figure of Jesus.”

In one of the main gallery halls, the exhibit features the 150 works by some 40 artists, in which the evolving attitudes of Jewish, Zionist and Israeli artists toward Jesus is on display..

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There are the classic works that place Christian-inspired images in classically Zionist settings, in which Jesus becomes a metaphor for the rebirth of the Jewish people in the Promised Land, and more contemporary, 20th- and 21st-century Israeli artists, who saw Jesus as a more familiar symbol of personal and universal suffering.

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The show, which opened in December, brings together works from the museum’s collections and from private and public collections in Israel, as well as several pieces borrowed from the National Museum in Warsaw and Centre Pompidou in Paris. The exhibit is open until April 22, 2017.

It’s a collection of works that Mendelsohn, who has been a curator at the Israel Museum for 20 years, has thought about for much of that time.

“For me, the art history process starts when I see something as part of my daily museum activity,” he said. “It’s a question of how religion and art connect.”

In order to tackle the many works dealing with Jesus, Mendelsohn divided the exhibit into sections, looking at Jesus deployed as a problematic figure in Jewish history, Jesus as the enemy, as a symbol of anti-Semitism, and as someone who had a “huge effect on Jewish existence,” he said.

 

The exhibit begins with “Jesus Preaching in Capernaum,” the last, unfinished piece from 1879 by Maurycy Gottlieb, the Polish artist who died at just 23, and is perhaps best known for his famed Yom Kippur painting. This work resembles that peace, with a similar composition, as it is set in a synagogue, albeit in Kfar Nahum or Capernaum, the northern Galilean town where Jesus famously preached.

Featuring Jesus in the centre with a mix of congregants listening to him, Gottlieb looked at Jesus as a Jew, and as a possible bridge between Christians and Jews, perhaps harkening to what could happen in his native Poland.

“It sets a tone for the show,” said Mendelsohn. “Here was Jesus, and he had a moral, universal, humanistic message.”

It’s a message that echoes the thoughts of German-Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelsohn — whom the curator is not related to — who saw Jesus as a moral Jew, as a prophet, perhaps one of the greatest Jews, but not as God.

“It takes Jesus back to the Jews,” said Mendelsohn.

To the right of Gottlieb’s work is “In the Shadow of the Cross,” a massive piece by Polish painter Samuel Hirszenberg, who worked a generation later. Taking a far darker, more sinister look, the Zionist painter created a difficult image of a wandering Jew, barely dressed, wandering among corpses in a cemetery.

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It hung in the original Bezalel art school building in Jerusalem for many years, portraying the emergence of the Zionist movement, said Mendelsohn, and the early pioneers’ escape from Europe and anti-Semitism.

The third wall of the first section is completed with Chagall’s “Yellow Crucifixion” from 1942, depicting a Jew with the halo of a Christian saint, wearing phylacteries.

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“Many don’t know that Chagall was attracted to and obsessed by Jesus as a figure of Jewish pain and suffering,” said Mendelsohn.

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So was Rubin, apparently. One section of the exhibit is devoted to several of his paintings, beginning with that early self-portrait that looks quite different from his other works, noted Mendelsohn.

“When I looked at this, I thought it was a strange Rubin,” he said. “It was all about his agony. Rubin was very interested in the story of Jesus.”

It was painted during Rubin’s early period when he spent some time in New York after 10 years in Romania and a year before that in pre-state Palestine.

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That piece is followed by others from Rubin, including one of an old, religious Jew sitting on a bench with a resurrected Jesus, and others featuring a Madonna, lolling on what looks like the shore of the Galilee, with a baby that could be the baby Jesus reborn in the land of the Jews.

 

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“It’s resurrection of the birth of the baby, all about new beginnings,” said Mendelsohn.

A painting by Moshe Castel, who was born in Ottoman-era Palestine to a religious family, was discovered recently in a locked cupboard of the Moshe Castel Museum of Art in Ma’ale Adumim. It was painted after the artist’s newborn baby and wife died following childbirth.

The painter, who lived in Safed, secluded himself in a monastery and painted the dark, sad self-portrait that mimics other art of Jesus as the long-suffering, misunderstood prophet.

As the exhibit moves into more modern times, there are different sides of Jesus portrayed as well. Yigal Tumarkin, an immigrant from Germany whose father wasn’t Jewish, looks at the crucifixion in his rough, sharp-edged sculpture made from salvaged goods found in Bedouin camps, as he interpreted the tensions in Israeli society and prototypes of Christian art.

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Moshe Gershuni’s exhibited works focus primarily on the blood of the crucifixion, perhaps creating a new testament between him and the Israeli public after he came out of the closet as gay, conjectured Mendelsohn.

בעין תודעה - מה נורא המקום הזה-3There are photographs of performance art by multimedia artist Motti Mizrachi, who is disabled, and walked down the Via Dolorosa in 1973 with a cross on his back. Another set of photographs juxtapose a newspaper photograph of a dead Palestinian man being carried during the First Intifada, with the famed paintings of the disciples carrying the crucified Jesus.

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The exhibit ends with the now-famous photo by Nes Adi, “Untitled (Last Supper),” a staged photo of Israeli soldiers eating a mess-hall dinner that echoes the “Last Supper” painting by Leonardo da Vinci.

Then there is the video installation by sculptor and installation artist Sigalit Landau, who filmed a series at the Dead Sea, including a piece depicting her floating on a whole watermelon. It conjures images of Mary with Jesus, as Landau’s hands are stretched to the sides, evoking the cross.

“Israelis are funny about Jesus,” said Mendelsohn. “But when we scrape the surface, we realise that there is a lot of Christian imagery all around us, even if we’re unaware of it.”

“Behold The Man: Jesus in Israeli Art,” Israel Museum, open until April 22, 2017.

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Art and Theatre 

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With the depiction of Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, there is a great danger of causing offence – particularly if this is done in a satirical or a mocking caricature of them. Jews, Christians and Moslems do not take kindly to such renderings. Anger, disgust, protest, rage and violence may result from those who have been offended, expressing outrage towards the artist and media personnel  who are involved in publicising the offensive material. This is the recent response to the McJesus sculpture and the Charlie Hebdo cartoon – the Christian reaction was comparatively mild and measured in comparison to the cartoon depiction of the Prophet of Islam:

McJesus Sculpture

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McJesus’ sculpture sparks outrage among Haifa’s Christians
Arab Christians call for the removal of sculpture that portrays Ronald McDonald as Jesus on the cross; on Friday, protesters hurled a firebomb and stones at the museum, wounding 3 police officers.
[Associated Press |Published:  01.15.19 , 16:23]

An art exhibit featuring a crucified Ronald McDonald has sparked protests by Haifa’s Arab Christian minority.

Hundreds of Christians calling for the removal of the sculpture, entitled “McJesus,” demonstrated at the museum in the northern city on Friday. The police said rioters hurled a firebomb at the museum and threw stones that wounded three police officers. Authorities dispersed the crowds with tear gas and stun grenades.
Church representatives brought their grievances to the district court Monday, demanding it order the removal of the exhibit’s most offensive items, including Barbie doll renditions of a bloodied Jesus and the Virgin Mary.

https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5447307,00.html

Charlie Hebdo

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[From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia]

Charlie Hebdo: from the French ‘Charlie Weekly,’ is a French satirical weekly magazine, featuring cartoons, reports, polemics, and jokes. Irreverent and stridently non-conformist in tone, the publication describes itself as above all secular, skeptic, and atheist, far-left-wing, and anti-racist publishing articles about the extreme right (especially the French nationalist National Front party), religion (Catholicism, Islam, Judaism), politics and culture.

The magazine has been the target of two terrorist attacks, in 2011 and 2015. Both were presumed to be in response to a number of controversial Muhammad cartoons it published. In the second of these attacks, 12 people were killed, including publishing director Charb and several other prominent cartoonists.

Charlie Hebdo first appeared in 1970 as a companion to the monthly Hara-Kiri magazine, after a previous title was banned for mocking the death of former French President Charles de Gaulle. In 1981 publication ceased, but the magazine was resurrected in 1992. Its current editor-in-chief is Gérard Biard. The previous editors were François Cavanna (1970–1981) and Philippe Val (1992–2009). The magazine is published every Wednesday, with special editions issued on an unscheduled basis.

ZOG

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Monopoly Board Game Parody of Jewish Control of World Finances

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ZOG – Zionist Occupied Government that controls the world 

Equally, to single out Jews for ridicule and to hold to anti-Semitic and conspiracy theories  that claim that they control world finances and governments – called ZOG. Alas, even Jeremy Corbyn’s the Labour leader was slow to condemn such ideas:

A Step too far

No serious minded person likes folk to poke fun or ridicule at that which is sacred to them, because of their particular faith – Jews, Christians and Moslems each have their redlines that when folk cross them they voice their opposition as is the case of the two examples given above:

  • McJesus’ sculpture
  • Prophet Muhammad depicted wearing a turban that in the shape of a bomb.
  • Ant-Semitic Monopoly board game mural

While satire and humour may be part of expression of free-speech, however, for some folk there is definitely a crossover point where those who are ridiculing that which fundamental to their faith go too far and they result in giving offence. This is clearly so in these cases that I have given, as well as to perpetuate anti-Semitic tropes as depicted in the last two image above.

Art as self-expression:

You will recall that I did a series of programmes during 2017 on the image of Jesus in Jewish and Israeli art. These were based upon the book by Amatai Mendelsohn –

Behold the Man: Jesus in Israeli Art

Various aspects of this subject were considered over a number of months on my blog. One example is –

Behold the Man: Between Judaism, Zionism, and Christianity

Posted on September 13, 2017:

Behold the Man: Between Judaism, Zionism, and Christianity

In this programme I wish to explore the theme –

From Personal Experience to National Identity

Art that is true art is not simply a dispassionate and visual depiction of a given subject. For the true artist, for her or his work to have a significant impact, it must generally convey something of the artist who created the piece of work – this is equally true when we think about the amazing world in which we live. There is an intelligence behind it that thinks and feels [mind and heart – will and emotions] and those who believe, call the ONE the Creator G_D. For we do not live in a random universe, but it has a perfect order and design, like the fingerprints of the sculptor or brush strokes of the painter.

I recall the work of the sculptor Babara Hepworth who drew her inspiration from the costal environment in which she lived. The crashing of the sea sculpting the rock formation in the cove near where she lived is reflected  the awesome beauty that the motion of the sea carved from the rocks. Her inspired work reflects this starkness of the visual and audio impressions that were imprinted on her mind and reflected in her sculptures.

Image II 1960 by Dame Barbara Hepworth 1903-1975

Image II 1960 Dame Barbara Hepworth 1903-1975 Presented by the artist 1967 http://www.tate.org.uk/art/work/T00958

Image II 1960 Dame Barbara Hepworth 1903-1975 Presented by the artist 1967 http://www.tate.org.uk/art/work/T00958

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Surgeon about his craft, like a Sculptor

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A risky challenge

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Mark Anatokolsky

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Marc Chagall

There is a risky and challenging undertaking that faces the Jewish and Israeli artist who seeks to depict Jesus, with the attendant danger and scope for being misunderstood. Both Marc Chagall and Mark Anatokolsky both faced severe criticism for depicting a Jewish looking Jesus – “Why did you paint/sculpture Christ?” said their fellow Jews and “Why did you paint/sculpture Christ like that?” said gentiles when confronted with a very Jewish looking Jesus. No one said that it would be easy, but then artist are often people who challenge the status quo and press the margins of what folk perceive as being acceptable. May one say that they live dangerously. Like the Chinese Chinese avant garde artist Wi Wi  who was driven into exile for his challenging the authoritarian communist rule in his native China.

From Personal Experience to National Identity

 

 

Moshe Castel, Crucifixion, ca. 1948. Ink on paper, 30 x 21 cm.                                             The Moshe Castel Museum of Art, Ma’ale Adumim, Israel

Moshe Castel

Moshe Castel 1900 – 1991, was born in Israel to Jewish parents that had lived in the Jerusalem for many generations. However, he lived in Paris from 1927 – 1940. Although his paintings dealt with general themes, in the European expressionistic style, when he returned to Israel, he did two paintings of deep significance related to our theme of Jesus in Jewish and Israeli art – they we both depicted a crucifixion of Jesus.

 

 

Paintings in sequence: Chaim Soutine 1 and 2,  3; Francis Bacon  4, 5, 6, & 7                                

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As I have said above that the personal life of the artist almost always has an impact upon the content that is portrayed, relating to personal events and impressions.

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Painting by Roni Mechanic

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Take for example this painting done by me – you will notice that there  are  the image of three fish. On closer examination, there is a large whale above a dolphin and in the bottom left hand corner there is a shark. My wife Elisheva pointed out to me that she thought that the picture expressed a turbulent time that I had been facing and that the whale symbolised G_D’s protection over me, the dolphin, that was being threatened by the shark. I had not consciously painted these three fish with that in mind, but I had to agree with her summation of the imagery in the painting.

Similarly, Moshe Castel’s Crucifixion paintings gave expression to a very painful episode in his personal life. He painted these in 1948, when he withdrew from public life, spending a year in a monastery on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. This retreat took place after the death of his wife who died giving birth, and their child who died some three years later. It is in an expressive style, very similar to the work of Chaim Soutine. We should note that the third painting by Soutine of the human butchered body is echoed in Francis Bacon’s work – [See panel above for examples of their work]Castel depicts himself as the crucified Jesus, against a background of mountains on a stormy night. The depiction is reminiscent of  Matthias Groenewolt’s Isenheim crucifixion.

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In Castel’s depiction of Jesus, the face is that of the artist himself and the artist himself:

What Moshe Castel has done is not unique, Paul Gauguin did that as well in his Yellow Crucifixion. Vincent van Gogh’s Peita and Marc Chagall spoke of himself in his anguish as an artist as if he were being crucified. This type of portrayal of the artist as if he were Christ is a way of attempting to describe the depth of their personal anguish. It is particularly significant that Jewish and Israeli artist feel at liberty to cross this threshold of depicting Jesus’ crucified as not only an image of their own suffering, but equally as Chagall had done of Jewish suffering in general.

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Van Gogh – Peita

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Chagall’s Anguish

Amatai Mendelsohn says, that it is apparent that an enormous emotional investment went into this surprising painting by Castel. One wonders if his time in the Catholic monastery had an influence upon him. This is pure conjecture on my part, but it does not completely surprise me that he should have painted this crucifixion that is at the heart of the Catholic and Christian/Messianic faith. All the more so that these images of the crucified Christ were never seen during the artist life, as the were found locked away in a cupboard in his home after his death.

A great taboo surrounds the question of Jewish and Israeli artist daring to depict the figure and person of Jesus still to this day. Mendelsohn continues in his discussion, that the inscription that went above the painting was planned in two preparatory sketches in which Castle used the proper Hebrew name for Jesus in place of the INRI – he wrote “Yeshua” instead of the “Yeshu,” that is often said and written derisively and is an acronym for “may his name and memory be obliterated.” As I have conjectured, Mendelsohn says, this suggests that the painter’s positive view, rather than the usual Jewish revolution towards Jesus’ name is implied by Castel’s rendering of it.

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George Rouault Christ de face [detail]

This second painting by Moshe Castle [see below on blog], also unknown to critics or the public is a depiction of the crucifixion of Jesus, the head surrounded by a halo, and a cloth wrapped around his loins, suggesting a prayer shawl – tallit. Also included is the figure of a Jewish man wearing a skull-cap and a Jewish woman standing beneath the cross on which Jesus hung. There is a third figure with his back to the viewers, also wearing a skull cap. Two angels hover beneath the hands of the crucified figure.

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In Paris, Castel had met Chagall and Soutine, and other Jewish artist of the Jewish School of Paris.

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André Warnod, Les Berceaux de la jeune peinture (1925). Cover illustration by Amedeo Modigliani

The Paris “Jewish” School

The term “School of Paris” was used in 1925 by André Warnod [fr] to refer to the many foreign-born artists who had migrated to Paris.[3] The term soon gained currency, often as a derogatory label by critics who saw the foreign artists—many of whom were Jewish—as a threat to the purity of French art.[4] Art critic Louis Vauxcelles, noted for coining the terms “Fauvism” and “Cubism”, also meant disparagingly, called immigrant artists unwashed “Slavs disguised as representatives of French art”.[5] Waldemar George, himself a French Jew, in 1931 lamented that the School of Paris name “allows any artist to pretend he is French…it refers to French tradition but instead annihilates it.”[6]

School of Paris artists were progressively marginalised. Beginning in 1935 art publications no longer wrote about Chagall, just magazines for Jewish audiences, and by June 1940 when the Vichy government took power, School of Paris artists could no longer exhibit in Paris at all.[6]

The artists working in Paris between World War I and World War II experimented with various styles including Cubism, Orphism, Surrealism and Dada. Foreign and French artists working in Paris included Jean Arp, Joan Miró, Constantin Brâncuși, Raoul Dufy, Tsuguharu Foujita, artists from Belarus like Michel Kikoine, Pinchus Kremegne, and Jacques Lipchitz, the Polish artist Marek Szwarc and others such as Russian-born prince Alexis Arapoff.[7]

A significant subset, the Jewish artists, came to be known as the Jewish School of Paris or the School of Montparnasse.[8] The “core members were almost all Jews, and the resentment expressed toward them by French critics in the 1930s was unquestionably fuelled by anti-Semitism.”[9] One account points to the 1924 Salon des Indépendants, which decided to separate the works of French-born artists from those by immigrants; in response critic Roger Allard [fr] referred to them as the School of Paris.[9][10] Jewish members of the group included Emmanuel Mané-Katz, Chaim Soutine, Adolphe Féder, Chagall, Moïse Kisling, Maxa Nordau and Shimshon Holzman.[11]

The artists of the Jewish School of Paris were stylistically diverse. Some, like Louis Marcoussis, worked in a cubist style, but most tended toward expression of mood rather than an emphasis on formal structure.[8] Their paintings often feature thickly brushed or troweled impasto. The Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme has works from School of Paris artists including Pascin, Kikoine, Soutine, Orloff and Lipschitz.[12]

In the aftermath of the war, “nationalistic and anti-Semitic attitudes were discredited, and the term took on a more general use denoting both foreign and French artists in Paris”.[4] But although the “Jewish problem” trope continued to surface in public discourse, art critics ceased making ethnic distinctions in using the term. While in the early 20th century French art critics contrasted The School of Paris and the École de France, after World War II the question was School of Paris vs School of New York.[13]

Post-World War II (Après-guerre), the term “School of Paris” often referred to tachisme, and lyrical abstraction, a European parallel to American Abstract Expressionism. These artists are also related to CoBrA.[14] Important proponents were Jean Dubuffet, Pierre Soulages, Jean-Michel Coulon, Nicolas de Staël, Hans Hartung, Serge Poliakoff, Bram van Velde, Georges Mathieu, Jean Messagier and Zoran Mušič, among others. Many of their exhibitions took place at the Galerie de France in Paris, and then at the Salon de Mai where a group of them exhibited until the 1970s.

________________________________________________

Moshe Castel’s second painting of The Crucifixion, 1940 – 1945, is a watercolour on paper, mounted on canvas, 50 x 36 cms, The Moshe Castel Meseum of Art, Ma’ale Adumim.

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This painting was influenced by Marc Chagall and by George Henri Rousalt (see detail of the head of Christ, above).

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George Henri Rousalt

Chagall’s White Crucifixion is the most important painting of the crucified Jewish Christ of the Paris Jewish School.

The Expressionistic style of Rousalt, was influenced by religious icons and medieval artistic rendering of Biblical New Testament themes. The use of heavy bold colours, shapes and lines giving expression to the emotion and the drama of the death of Jesus.

While the depiction of the image of humans and the divine was forbidden in Judaism, Jewish artist looked elsewhere for references to be able to depict biblical and religious themes. What makes the Paris Jewish School’s work unique is that these Jewish artists were not under the constraint of the Jewish religious establishment who would have disapproved of their rendering of the image if Jesus in particular. One should note that Marc Chagall’s windows at the Jerusalem Hadassah Hospital of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, is largely abstract in its rendering of these biblical themes.

 

The Measure of the Person 

Apart from Moshe Castel’s two Crucifixion paintings and a few sketches, he did not publicly paint any images of Jesus in his work. He was the son of a respected rabbi, and he was intimately familiar with his religious and cultural Jewish heritage. In his art he explored the Jewish Bible, mysticism, and other Jewish themes. The enigma of what inspired him to pain these two Crucifixions after he left Paris and returned to Eretz-Israel, remains unanswered. What I personally find fascinating that in the desire to express his deepest, private pain and loss, he turned to the theme off the crucifixion of Jesus.

Amatai Mendelsohn suggests that a reason for this, may be found in his bitter anger towards the Jewish G_D. How ironic that while he sought to give expression to his anger towards HaShem, who he must have felt had abandoned him, nonetheless, he turns to his Jewish Son, who was despised and rejected by Jew and gentile alike. This private anger  towards God and fascination with Jesus, may suggest his ambivalence and fear about identifying himself publicly with an image that traditionally was considered as idolatrous. He did not stand alone for there were other Jewish people like Uri Zvi Greenberg, the poet, who was also drawn to his “brother’ on the cross, and this included Aharon Kabak, whose novel on the life of Jesus, also rose out of tragic personal loss.

Looking UNTO Jesus

Jewish people like so many others in their darkest hour of loss and despair have turned to Jesus – Yeshua and found him as their Messiah and Lord. Was this the case of Moshe Castel’s darkest secret that only emerged after his death? Locked away in a hidden cupboard, but there in the hidden chambers of his heart was the Saviour who was able to give him comfort and hope.

The prophet Zechariah says,

“And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son: (12:10).

Isaiah 52:13 – 53:12:

13

Behold, my servant shall deal prudently, he shall be exalted and extolled, and be very high.

14

As many were astounded at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men:

15

So shall he sprinkle many nations; the kings shall shut their mouths at him: for that which had not been told them shall they see; and that which they had not heard shall they consider.Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?

2

For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.

3

He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4

Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

5

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

6

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

7

He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opens not his mouth.

8

He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken.

9

And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth.

10

Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.

11

He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.

12

Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
You too

You too can make the awesome discovery that the Suffering Sevant of G_D is both Lord and Messiah.This is a reality that countless Jews and gentiles testify to.

Amen.

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The Lost Jews of Europe: Germany

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Germany and Nazi Occupied Territories During WWII

Why the Jews?

The answer to this question is a complex one and there is no one simple answer to why the German nation that produced a Goethe, Heine, Bach, Handel, Mendelssohn, Beethoven, Mahler, Kant,  Hegel, Dilthey, Heidiger, Marx, Einstein,  could also produce a Wagner, Nietzsche and Hitler? Though Nietzsche was not a proto-Nazi, but Nazi thinkers did imbibe some of his philosophical ideas in their ideology, while Wagner was inherently anti-Semitic and desired to return to the pre-Christian, pagan roots of the German people.

It has been said if there had been no Hitler, there would have been no Holocaust. However, it is not as simple as that – Take just one example of the Jewish massacre of the 12the century:

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Massacre of the Jews of Metz during the First Crusade, by Auguste Migette

El Malé Rahamim – God of Mercy prayer for the murdered communities, in prayer book from the city of Altona

The Rhineland massacres, also known as the persecutions of 1096 or Gzerot Tatnó[1] (Hebrew: גזרות תתנ”ו‎ Hebrew for “Edicts of 4856”), were a series of mass murders of Jews perpetrated by mobs of German Christians of the People’s Crusade in the year 1096, or 4856 according to the Jewish calendar.

Prominent leaders of crusaders involved in the massacres included Peter the Hermit and especially Count Emicho.[2] As part of this persecution, the destruction of Jewish communities in Speyer, Worms and Mainz was noted as the “Hurban Shum” (Destruction of Shum).[3] These were new persecutions of the Jews in which peasant crusaders from France and Germany attacked Jewish communities. A number of historians refer to the antisemitic events as “pogroms“.[4]

According to David Nirenberg,[5] the events of 1096 in the Rhineland “occupy a significant place in modern Jewish historiography and are often presented as the first instance of an antisemitism that would henceforth never be forgotten and whose climax was the Holocaust.”[6]

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhineland_massacres)

Hitler was not a German

Adolf Hitler was not a German, but he was an Austrian who only became a naturalised German citizen on February 25, 1932. This does not mean that the German nation is therefore not responsible for the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews. Once National Socialism became the ruling regime, the majority of the German nation willingly complied with his Nazi policy of the Final Solution to the Jewish Question.

Killing Fields

In 1933, before Hitler, there were approximately 500,000 Jews in Germany. Most were Germans first and Jews second. Hitler and the National Socialists of course changed that.

Germany was a nation of affluent Jews, much more so than in Poland and Russia naturally. That being said, there were still MANY Jews in Germany who were far from being wealthy. Only a minority of German Jews were bankers and stock brokers. Most were working men. Machinists, metal fabricators, mill operators and foundry men. Only the National Socialists deluded themselves that ALL Jews were rich and all were stock brokers, bankers and lawyers. When the National Socialists began to systematically deprive Jews of their civil rights, German Jews began to leave in earnest.

I have no idea of how many Jews were still in Germany in 1939. Over 300,000 had already fled the country and many of the others were arrested and confined in camps, later to be killed. Not all, and oddly there were some who stayed the war and were never placed in camps, but not so many.

Why Such a Hatred?

In Hitler’s Mein Kamph he describes the development of his loathing of the Jewish people and how it gradually developed. This pathological hate says more about Hitler’s own psychological state, than it does about the Jewish people as a group worthy of the kind of hate filled madness that afflicted the deeply disturbed Hitler. He was on the one hand consumed with an overwhelming sense of failure. He was an unemployed, social misfit who worked sporadically, in low paid jobs after he was demobbed after WWI. He had had a moderately successful military career, but only achieved the rank of sergeant. He was prone to fits of rage and even ranting and people found his at times uncouth and awaked. However, on the other hand he was consumed with a sense of destiny and delusions of grander. When he was not working he spent his time copiously reading every news paper and article about the socio-political condition in Germany, post the humiliating defeat of WWI.

With the great economic hardship and social unrest in Germany, with high unemployment due to the crippling financial situation, Hitler became involved in politics and join various right wing political groups that were striving a better deal and an end to the humiliation of the German people. He blamed capitalists, Bolsheviks and Jewish financiers for many of the ills that they were experiencing.

Few would have thought that the Nazi Party, starting as a gang of unemployed soldiers in 1919, would become the legal government of Germany by 1933. In fourteen years, a once obscure corporal, Adolf Hitler, would become the Chancellor of Germany.

                                                                                                       

World War I ended in 1918 with a grisly total of 37 million casualties, including 9 million dead combatants. German propaganda had not prepared the nation for defeat, resulting in a sense of injured German national pride. Those military and political leaders who were responsible claimed that Germany had been “stabbed in the back” by its leftwing politicians, Communists, and Jews. When a new government, the Weimar Republic, tried to establish a democratic course, extreme political parties from both the right and the left struggled violently for control. The new regime could neither handle the depressed economy nor the rampant lawlessness and disorder.

 This site explores the consequences of Germany’s defeat in WWI.

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                   

The German population swallowed the bitter pill of defeat as the victorious Allies punished Germany severely. In the Treaty of Versailles , Germany was disarmed and forced to pay reparations to France and Britain for the huge costs of the war.

This site contains the complete Treaty of Versailles as well as maps and related material.

The German Workers’ Party , the forerunner of the Nazi Party, espoused a right-wing ideology, like many similar groups of demobilised soldiers. Adolf Hitler joined this small political party in 1919 and rose to leadership through his emotional and captivating speeches. He encouraged national pride, militarism, and a commitment to the Volk  and a racially “pure” Germany. Hitler condemned the Jews, exploiting antisemitic feelings that had prevailed in Europe for centuries. He changed the name of the party to the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, called for short, the Nazi Party (or NSDAP). By the end of 1920, the Nazi Party had about 3,000 members. A year later Hitler became its official leader, or Führer.

Adolf Hitler’s attempt at an armed overthrow of local authorities in Munich, known as the Beer Hall Putsch , failed miserably. The Nazi Party seemed doomed to fail and its leaders, including Hitler, were subsequently jailed and charged with high treason. However, Hitler used the courtroom at his public trial as a propaganda platform, ranting for hours against the Weimar government. By the end of the 24-day trial Hitler had actually gained support for his courage to act. The right-wing presiding judges sympathised with Hitler and sentenced him to only five years in prison, with eligibility for early parole. Hitler was released from prison after one year. Other Nazi leaders were given light sentences also. This site details Hitler’s Beer Hall Putsch.

While in prison, Hitler wrote volume one of Mein Kampf (My Struggle), which was published in 1925. This work detailed Hitler’s radical ideas of German nationalism, antisemitism, and anti-Bolshevism. Linked with Social Darwinism, the human struggle that said that might makes right, Hitler’s book became the ideological base for the Nazi Party’s racist beliefs and murderous practices. This site discusses many of the ideas contained within Mein Kampf.

After Hitler was released from prison, he formally resurrected the Nazi Party. Hitler began rebuilding and reorganising the Party, waiting for an opportune time to gain political power in Germany. The Conservative military hero Paul von Hindenburg was elected president in 1925, and Germany stabilised.

Hitler skillfully maneuvered through Nazi Party politics and emerged as the sole leader. The Führerprinzip, or leader principle, established Hitler as the one and only to whom Party members swore loyalty unto death. Final decision making rested with him, and his strategy was to develop a highly centralized and structured party that could compete in Germany’s future elections. Hitler hoped to create a bureaucracy which he envisioned as “the germ of the future state.”

The Nazi Party began building a mass movement. From 27,000 members in 1925, the Party grew to 108,000 in 1929. The SA  was the paramilitary unit of the Party, a propaganda arm that became known for its strong arm tactics of street brawling and terror. The SS  was established as an elite group with special duties within the SA, but it remained inconsequential until Heinrich Himmler  became its leader in 1929. By the late twenties, the Nazi Party started other auxiliary groups. The Hitler Youth , the Student League and the Pupils’ League were open to young Germans. The National Socialist Women’s League allowed women to get involved. Different professional groups–teachers, lawyers and doctors–had their own auxiliary units.

From 1925 to 1927, the Nazi Party failed to make inroads in the cities and in May 1928, it did poorly in the Reichstag elections, winning only 2.6% of the total vote. The Party shifted its strategy to rural and small town areas and fuelled antisemitism by calling for expropriation of Jewish agricultural property and by condemning large Jewish department stores. Party propaganda proved effective at winning over university students, veterans’ organisations, and professional groups, although the Party became increasingly identified with young men of the lower middle classes. 

1929

The Great Depression began in 1929 and wrought worldwide economic, social, and psychological consequences. The Weimar democracy proved unable to cope with national despair as unemployment doubled from three million to six million, or one in three, by 1932. The existing “Great Coalition” government, a combination of left-wing and conservative parties, collapsed while arguing about the rising cost of unemployment benefits.Reich president Paul von Hindenburg’s advisers persuaded him to invoke the constitution’s emergency presidential powers. These powers allowed the president to restore law and order in a crisis. Hindenburg created a new government, made up of a chancellor and cabinet ministers, to rule by emergency decrees instead of by laws passed by the Reichstag. So began the demise of the Weimar democracy.

Heinrich Brüning  was the first chancellor under the new presidential system. He was unable to unify the government, and in September 1930, there were new elections. The Nazi Party won an important victory, capturing 18.3% of the vote to make it the second largest party in the Reichstag.

The Great Depression has a large impact on Germany

This is a description of the Nazi Party’s 1930 campaign for Reichstag seats.

1932

Hindenburg’s term as president was ending in the spring of 1932. At age 84, he was reluctant to run again, but knew that if he didn’t, Hitler would win. Hindenburg won the election, but Hitler received 37% of the vote.Germany’s government remained on the brink of collapse. The SA brownshirts, about 400,000 strong, were a part of daily street violence. The economy was still in crisis. In the election of July 1932, the Nazi Party won 37% of the Reichstag seats, thanks to a massive propaganda campaign. For the next six months, the most powerful German leaders were embroiled in a series of desperate political manoeuvrings. Ultimately, these major players severely underestimated Hitler’s political abilities.

A more complete account of the complexity of German politics in 1932 is available.

Lesson plans, discussion questions, term paper topics, reproducible handouts, and other resources for teaching about the rise of the Nazi Party are available here.Mobs broke into synagogues, vandalising their interiors, smashing everything they could find. View of the old synagogue in Aachen after its destruction on Kristallnacht.”

1938

On November 9 to November 10, 1938, in an incident known as “Kristallnacht”, Nazis in Germany torched synagogues, vandalised Jewish homes, schools and businesses and killed close to 100 Jews. In the aftermath of Kristallnacht, also called the “Night of Broken Glass,” some 30,000 Jewish men were arrested and sent to Nazi concentration camps. German Jews had been subjected to repressive policies since 1933, when Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) became chancellor of Germany. However, prior to Kristallnacht, these Nazi policies had been primarily nonviolent. After Kristallnacht, conditions for German Jews grew increasingly worse. During World War II (1939-45), Hitler and the Nazis implemented their so-called “Final Solution” to the what they referred to as the “Jewish problem,” and carried out the systematic murder of some 6 million European Jews in what came to be known as the Holocaust.

Hitler and Anti-Semitism

1933 – 1938

Soon after Adolph Hitler became Germany’s chancellor in January 1933, he began instituting policies that isolated German Jews and subjected them to persecution. Among other things, Hitler’s Nazi Party, which espoused extreme German nationalism and anti-Semitism, commanded that all Jewish businesses be boycotted and all Jews be dismissed from civil-service posts. In May 1933, the writings of Jewish and other “un-German” authors were burned in a communal ceremony at Berlin’s Opera House. Within two years, German businesses were publicly announcing that they no longer serviced Jews. The Nuremberg Laws, passed in September 1935, decreed that only Aryans could be full German citizens. Furthermore, it became illegal for Aryans and Jews to marry or have extramarital intercourse.

The Nuremberg Race Laws

At the annual party rally held in Nuremberg in 1935, the Nazis announced new laws which institutionalised many of the racial theories prevalent in Nazi ideology. The laws excluded German Jews from Reich citizenship and prohibited them from marrying or having sexual relations with persons of “German or related blood.” Ancillary ordinances to the laws disenfranchised Jews and deprived them of most political rights.

The Nuremberg Laws, as they became known, did not define a “Jew” as someone with particular religious beliefs. Instead, anyone who had three or four Jewish grandparents was defined as a Jew, regardless of whether that individual identified himself or herself as a Jew or belonged to the Jewish religious community. Many Germans who had not practiced Judaism for years found themselves caught in the grip of Nazi terror. Even people with Jewish grandparents who had converted to Christianity were defined as Jews.

For a brief period after Nuremberg, in the weeks before and during the 1936 Olympic Games held in Berlin, the Nazi regime actually moderated its anti-Jewish attacks and even removed some of the signs saying “Jews Unwelcome” from public places. Hitler did not want international criticism of his government to result in the transfer of the Games to another country. Such a loss would have been a serious blow to German prestige.

After the Olympic Games (in which the Nazis did not allow German Jewish athletes to participate), the Nazis again stepped up the persecution of German Jews. In 1937 and 1938, the government set out to impoverish Jews by requiring them to register their property and then by “Aryanizing” Jewish businesses. This meant that Jewish workers and managers were dismissed, and the ownership of most Jewish businesses was taken over by non-Jewish Germans who bought them at bargain prices fixed by Nazis. Jewish doctors were forbidden to treat non-Jews, and Jewish lawyers were not permitted to practice law.

Like everyone in Germany, Jews were required to carry identity cards, but the government added special identifying marks to theirs: a red “J” stamped on them and new middle names for all those Jews who did not possess recognisably “Jewish” first names—”Israel” for males, “Sara” for females. Such cards allowed the police to identify Jews easily.

Key Dates

September 15, 1935
Nuremberg Laws are instituted                                                    

At their annual party rally, the Nazis announce new laws that revoke Reich citizenship for Jews and prohibit Jews from marrying or having sexual relations with persons of “German or related blood.” “Racial infamy,” as this becomes known, is made a criminal offence. The Nuremberg Laws define a “Jew” as someone with three or four Jewish grandparents. Consequently, the Nazis classify as Jews thousands of people who had converted from Judaism to another religion, among them even Roman Catholic priests and nuns and Protestant ministers whose grandparents were Jewish.

October 18, 1935
New marriage requirements instituted

The “Law for the Protection of the Hereditary Health of the German People” requires all prospective marriage partners to obtain from the public health authorities a certificate of fitness to marry. Such certificates are refused to those suffering from “hereditary illnesses” and contagious diseases and those attempting to marry in violation of the Nuremberg Laws.

November 14, 1935
Nuremberg Law extended to other groups

The first supplemental decree of the Nuremberg Laws extends the prohibition on marriage or sexual relations between people who could produce “racially suspect” offspring. A week later, the minister of the interior interprets this to mean relations between “those of German or related blood” and Roma (Gypsies), blacks, or their offspring.

Yom Hashoah – Holocaust Remembrance Day 27/01/2019 Interfaith Service – Co. Durham

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Click on this link to listen:

Other Genocides:

remembering the genocides

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Yom HaShoah  – Holocaust Remembrance Day Service –

talk by Roni Mechanic,  27hJanuary, 2019

Then They Came For Me

I recall that during the late 1990’s my wife Elisheva, children and I were traveling by train across Germany on the way to Hamburg on route to Denmark. We were waiting for a connecting train at Osnabruck. It was a sleepy countryside station – we were sitting in the station café on the platform. We awaited our ‘transport’ to arrive. Our son was three years old, and our two daughters were in their teens. A German lady also sitting there showed an interest in our family group and we got chatting.

In my imagination a very different scenario was being played out – we were not waiting for our connection to Hamburg, but rather “transport” to one of the death camps in the east: Bregen-Belsen or Ravensbruck. You may think, “what a shocking and even vile thought?” But nonetheless it is was a horrible possibility if it were some 50 years earlier, from we had enough Jewish ancestry in our heritage to have included my family and I in Hitler’s Final Solution. Anyone up to one quarter Jewish was designated libel to extermination. None of the pleasant conversation with our fellow German traveller, but only Nazi SS guards, herding those waiting like cattle being sent to the abattoir for slaughter.

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.

Niemöller’s earliest speeches, written in 1946, lists the Communists, incurable patients, Jews and Jehovah’s Witnesses, and civilians in countries occupied by Nazi Germany. In all versions, the impact is carefully built up, by going from the “smallest, most distant” group to the largest, Jewish, group, and then finally to himself as a by then outspoken critic of Nazism. Niemöller made the cardinal “who cares about them” clear in his speech for the Confessing Church in Frankfurt on 6 January 1946, of which this is a partial translation.

[The best-known versions of the speech are the poems that began circulating by the 1950s.[1] The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum quotes the following text as one of the many poetic versions of the speech: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came_…#cite_note-quotation-1%5D

Jewish suffering and persecution

 Jewish suffering and persecution go back millennia, but reached its horrific climax in the Holocaust, when over six million Jewish people perished under Nazi Germany’s Final Solutionto the Jewish question/ problem. Hitler and his cohorts and numerous collaborators did not either perceive of or design the Holocaust upon a sudden whim, but it was the culmination of systematic hatred of the Jewish people in Europe. Though no one else can be blamed for Hitler’s heinous crimes, other than those who participate in it, yet centuries of bad Christian theology about the Jewish people did contribute to the final outcome. Accusations of Decide – “Christ killers,” was only finally revoked at Vatican II in the 1960’s. Negative attitudes, alas result in negative and destructive outcomes. Martin Luther’s tract On the Jews and Their Lies* is a pernicious piece of filth penned by an aged Luther. He may have been the great reformer of the Church, but this blight upon his record, remains a reality. Luther was by no means alone in his anti-Judaism and the denigration of the Jewish people and the Jewish religion.

*[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Jews_and_Their_Lies].

My objective is not to induce a deep sense of guilt, but to give a stark warning to all of us that the progression from anti-Judaism, quickly develops into anti-Semitism and this is all too often followed by anti-Zionism. This is sometimes referred to as the new face of anti-Semitism. With the desire for justice for the Palestinians, it must equally be coupled with an equal desire for justice for the Jews, not only in Israel, but throughout the world.Martin Luther King gives expression to this desire in his speech “I HAVE A DREAM,” AUGUST 28 1963:

However, together with Dr Martin Luther King Jr., I too have a dream: “When we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men,  Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics,will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

“Free at last! Free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!” (Martin Luther King, Jr.). In its original context Dr King was expressing his dream to witness the end of racial segregation in the United States of America and particularly for its black citizens – nonetheless, he equally acknowledges that freedom from racial oppression for one, is freedom for all. In this he included Jewish people.

Why do strangers kill strangers?

 You may ask: “Why do strangers kill strangers?” Equally, “Why do neighbours kill neighbours? Think of the Greeks and Turks; Rwanda; Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina, when Serbian, Croatian and Moslem turned on each other. Where communities and families that had lived together for centuries suddenly go insane, murdering each other?  While we commemorate the victims of genocides, we need to ask, but do we do so with understanding? These questions are asked by Timothy Snyder in his book Black Earth.

[To order Black Earth for £20 go to bookshop.theguardian.com].

In Simon Reeves documentary series on the Tropic of Capricorn he interviewed a Herero historian on a visit to Namibia. She said, that the Germans have practiced [genocide] on the Herero people before they did that to the Jewish people. Between 65000 and 80000 Hereros were destroyed by the Germans around 1908. Then there was the Armenian genocide by the Turks from 1910 -1918 when a million and a half died.Though the most heinous Jewish and Gypsy genocide under the Nazis, from 1939 – 1945 has become part of the history of the mid-twentieth century, yet still other acts of genocides have followed. The Soviet and Chinese mass murder of its own citizens under Stalin and Mao, plus, Biafra, Cambodia, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina,Syria, Darfur, Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, and Rohingya Moslems, and so the list goes on.

Should we be confident that a holocaust is behind us? Just because some of these killings are not officially recorded as ‘genocide,’ that does not diminish the reality of state sponsored mass killing that took place. Take for example the nearly 1000 infant mortality caused by the Apartheid forced removal of the black population of Grahamstown, Easter Cape, South Africa to Dimbaza a wasteland that is 40 miles away from Grahamstown – though this was not a deliberate act of genocide, nonetheless, this does not diminish the seriousness of the Apartheid government policy that resulted in the death of these children, partly due to no access to medical care.

 There is no place for complacency

 There is no room for complacency, because this world in which we live is a dangerous place. It is changing and reviving fears that were familiar in Hitler’s time and to which Hitler responded in the way that he did. He exploited the defeat and humiliation of the German nation after WWI. The Treaty of Versailles, brought German to its knees with not only its military defeat, but crippling economic retribution that was exacted upon it by the Allies. The history of the Holocaust is not over, for its precedent/ significance is eternal, and alas, its lessons have not yet been learned.

A history of the Holocaust must be contemporary, says Timothy Snyder, due to the fact that humankind is prone to forget. Equally, memory can be very selective, as we choose to recall and remember only those things that fit in with our world-view. The Holocaust is not only about history, it is equally a warning, says Snyder. It is not enough to say, “Never again!” – particularly when we live in such a dangerous age. There are ominous storm clouds building in the East and West. Xi’s China, Putin’s Russian and Trump’s America. Not forgetting the Middle-East theatre of engagement were proxy wars are being played out: Russia, America, NATO, UN, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, and Israel. PYPM –  the Push Me Pull Yougame is being enacted by the major global players.

 Our Guilty Silence

Dare we sit silently and not speak out against all forms of racial hatred and xenophobia? Wherever it raises its ugly head, we need to expose it and speak up and speak out against it. I grew up in Apartheid South Africa and as a privileged white person, I know that I could have done more than I did. Equally today, while we think of the death of the 6 million Jewish people, let us not forget the other genocides that have taken place in the last 100 years –a million and a half Gypsies, the physically and mentally disabled, homosexuals, and a multitude of Poles and Slavs also perished during WWII. Then there is the Armenian genocide at the hands of the Turks that has never been acknowledged. Even while we sit here in peace and security, there are other acts of cruelty being carried out in various parts of the world. A new partnership is being forged: The Campaign Against Anti-Semitism is a growing alliance of people all over the world speaking up, and standing against anti-Semitic hatred and acts of violence. I encourage everyone who loves God, to equally love his people the Jews and stand with them in this hour of opportunity and equally face the challenges that lay ahead. https://antisemitism.uk/introduction/

The Race Is Not to the Swift nor the Battle to the Strong

Let us draw some comfort from the Scripture that indicates to us “that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong.” (Eccl. 9:11.) Time and again the Scriptures indicate that those who endures to the end, they shall be delivered. The race of life is not a sprint, it is not the 100-meter dash, nor is it really a middle-distance run. It’s a marathon run. It’s a long-distance run. In the race of life, at times it is hard. It begins early. I was confronted by my first experience of anti-Semitism at the age of 9 when a fellow pupil in my class in Johannesburg, South Africa abused me for being a Jew.  Even 61 years later people I can recall that difficult experience at primary school. We remember what it felt like, perhaps, that the race was hard because you were too short or too skinny or you had to wear glasses or braces, or because you are from a different ethnic background or religion?

All of those things can either have negative or positive outcomes. Don’t let them define you or torment your soul. As you went and go through difficult times remember that the God of Israel is there and he neither slumbers or sleeps – He is the Shepherd of Israel. In these tests of life, none of us are promised that it will be an easy race. However, from the Book of Hebrews, the writer says, as you run the race of life: “And let us run with patience the race that is set before us” …So if the race sometimes seems difficult, this is what helps to build character. It puts steel into your soul. Don’t let it crush you, but “we shall overcome, some day.” Wherever you are currently, this is God’s appointed time for each one of us to run the race of life this day. The race is not too difficult; nor are the obstacles too hard to surmount.  Remember, the God of Jacob is with us and Jacobs beloved son Joseph the patriarch did come forth from prison to sit up the thorn on high. From a Christian perspective, so too, Jesus of Nazareth, did arise as the redeemer and Lord of all. Some may say, if Jesus is redeemer, then where is the universal peace that is meant to be part of the messianic reign? Isaiah the prophet of Israel does testify of the Servant of the Lord, who will suffer for humanity and be their sin bearer.

My blog: www.hotrodronisblog.com: for Shalom Radio UK.

Amen.

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Yom Hashoah – Holocaust Remembrance 2019

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Dr Sam Wells from St Martins-in-the Field, London, UK gave an excellent talk in 2016 at a conference in Co Durham which he based upon the book and Film entitled the Boy in the Striped Pyjamas and he renamed it, God in Stiped Pajamas – This is due to the fact that God is always with us when we suffer as he identifies with human suffering in and through the Suffering Servant of the LORD.

Dr Wells gave Roni permission to use his talk as he saw fit. This is beautifully read by Elisheva Mechanic on this occasion of Holocaust Remembrance on 27th January, 2019.

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