God, the Holocaust and a Pastor

Below is an interesting take on the John Hagee controversy. This is written by Dennis Prager, an orthodox Jew.

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God, the Holocaust and a Pastor

Comments about God and the Holocaust made in a sermon 10 years ago by a leading evangelical pastor, John Hagee, have received a great deal of attention. They have led to Sen. John McCain severing ties with the pastor, whose support the presumptive Republican presidential nominee had originally solicited.

Pastor Hagee, a major supporter of the Jewish people and Israel, citing verses from Jeremiah, said: "How did it [the Holocaust] happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said 'my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel.'"

I am a God-believing, Torah-believing, religious (though not Orthodox) Jew, author of a book on Judaism and a book on anti-Semitism who does not agree with this theological explanation of the Holocaust.

But the notion that God willed the Holocaust is neither anti-Jewish nor even un-Jewish. There are, after all, only two possible explanations regarding God and the Holocaust:

1. God allowed it but did not will it.

2. God willed it.

This is simple logic.

Like most other people, I find neither explanation religiously or morally, let alone emotionally, satisfying. But both are Jewishly acceptable. There is a long tradition in Judaism that collective Jewish suffering is often God-willed. On the Jewish holy days, the central prayer (the Amidah) of the Jewish service contains a paragraph beginning: "Because of our sins we were exiled from our land."

The author of the biblical book Lamentations wrote, upon seeing the first destruction of Jerusalem and the accompanying mass slaughter of Jews: "The Lord is like an enemy; He has swallowed up Israel… He has multiplied mourning and lamentation" (Lam 2.5). And the Talmud, the holiest Jewish work after the Bible, says that that horrific event occurred because of "gratuitous hatred," i.e., Jews hated one another for no good reason.

As Rabbi Jakob Petuchowski, one of the greatest Jewish scholars of the 20th century, wrote: "Much of the national suffering of the people of Israel was explained by the biblical Prophets in terms of punishment meted out by God to a sinful people."

Regarding the Holocaust specifically, Ignaz Maybaum was a major 20th century Jewish theologian who identified "the Holocaust victims as vicarious sacrificial offerings for the redemption of humanity…"

We recoil at the thought of a just, good and loving God willing the mass murder of so many innocent people. But that belief is not necessarily anti-Semitic.

Moreover, the alternate view that God simply lets all this evil and cruelty go on isn't satisfying either. Whether God directed the Holocaust or just allowed it to happen, in either case, many Jews are angry with Him for that. Anger toward God (as well as love toward Him) has a long history even among devout Jews. Petuchowski cites a medieval prayer by 12th century Jewish poet Isaac bar Shalom, who, after a pogrom, changed one word in a Jewish prayer (from "elim" to "ilmim'). As a result, "Who is like you among the gods, oh Lord" became "Who is like you among the silent, oh Lord."

I have written my own beliefs about the reasons for the Holocaust and all of anti-Semitism in the book I co-authored with Rabbi Joseph Telushkin, "Why the Jews? The Reason for Antisemitism" (Simon & Schuster, paper, 2003). They are, in short, that the Holocaust, like all Jew-hatred, is an inevitable result of the hatred by the evil of the world of God's Chosen People, who introduced to humanity a morally demanding God who judges the behavior of every individual.

Whatever one's views, however, what Hagee once said in a sermon is completely unworthy of the condemnation that it has received from critics who are obviously motivated by politics rather than by truth. Forcing the man to deny he is an anti-Semite is like forcing a kind and decent man to deny he is a bank robber.

Hagee is one of the most pro-Jewish Christians alive. No living Christian has devoted more of his life to combating anti-Semitism. He has received death threats from anti-Semites, and they have attacked his home. To accuse such a man of anything anti-Jewish renders both truth and anti-Semitism meaningless. Calling people who help Jews anti-Semitic is a gift to real anti-Semites. With no exception I am aware of, those who imply some anti-Jewish animus in Hagee do so in order to undermine an evangelical conservative and to manufacture a right-wing equivalence to the America-cursing, race-based Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

But as Bill Donohue, the head of the Catholic League, who had been very critical of Hagee for his strong criticisms of the Catholic Church -- for its historical treatment of Jews, no less -- said of Hagee: "I found him to be the strongest Christian defender of Israel I have ever met, and that is why attempts to portray him as anything but a genuine friend to the Jews -- one for whom the Holocaust is the horror of horrors -- is despicable."

Why God allowed the Holocaust and other evils is a mystery. What is not a mystery is why some people on the left, including some Jews who care far more about the left than about Jews, smear a courageous and good Christian pastor.

Dennis Prager is a radio show host, contributing columnist for Townhall.com, and author of 4 books including Happiness Is a Serious Problem: A Human Nature Repair Manual.

Saying Good Bye

All good things must come to an end. College. A good book. An epic movie. A powerful song. Love. Life.

If this small rock in time and space was the beginning and end of our existence, why make it better? Eat and drink, for tomorrow we die! Why have any hope or purpose? Darwinistic philosophy would teach us the survival of the fitness and that we should abide by the law of the jungle. What point is there even to living? Life is a random act, morality is a devised concept and love is merely a chemical reaction. Somehow, I think we were meant for so much more.

Heaven is a fulfillment of everything that we have held dear. It is the culmination, the grand coronation of everything that we have longed for. As St. Augustine said, "You have made us for yourselves, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you." Our heart's longings and desires have been twisted and turned into this mess of modern nihilistic and egotistical philosophy. Only upon another land can we ever be completed. As we migrate across this open plain, we head towards the Jordan River. One day we shall cross.

Up from the riverbanks, the immense reflections of crystal walls and pristine land will the city of Jerusalem shine down upon us. The gates beckon us to run, taking shelter in the warmth of the city square. There was will find lost friends and embrace new ones. The chapters do not end, for it is only the beginning of our adventure.

When we’ve been there ten thousand years,
Bright shining like the sun,
We've no less days to sing God’s praise
Than when we first begun.

An adventure that never ends, continuing in eternal freshness. Like the Grey Havens of Lord of the Rings, youth and vigor is preserved. One day. One day.

Blindness of Faith

There was a letter to the editor in today's OC Register that really caught my eye. To put it in more direct and descriptive terms, it blinded me with sheer locical idiosy. "Human free will and an all-powerful God are mutually exclusive... Religion is blindness because the harsh realities of life and death are just too much for many human beings to face." These two statements wounded my thought process and challenged my recent discoveries of faith. Quite frankly, the letter writer did not shake the foundation of my faith.

Mr. Miller believes that there is a contradiction in the belief that God has sovereign power and will yet allows his creation to be fully independent in their decision making. I would say that that is not the full story. God is both soveriegn and allows for freedom. Mr. Miller thinks that a being must be comprehendable in order to worship and trust. If we completely comprehended the all-powerful, why would we feel compelled to trust that same being? How could someone who created this wonderfully intricate universe be so plain that mortal men should fully understand Him?

We in the Western Modern World tend to view ourselves as the pinnacle of thought; whatever we do not discover does not exist. Typical scientific circles believed that there were no large ape creatures in the central Africa. They were proven wrong in the beginning of the Twentieth Century. Many people do not believe in Big Foot because of a lack of photographs, despite widespread testimony. Despite the precise of nature of the human heart, insect eyes and perfect planetary position, people believe that we arrived upon this planet through mere chance. Nevermind the connundrum with the origin of the matter that started the Big Bang.

He brings up the harsh realities of life as a defense against the plausibility of a just God. If freewill exists, then evil must be allowed for a time, until evil is rooted up (after people have decided on the existence of a higher being). Mr. Miller's argument is still incredibly weak. I would rebut and ask him about the problem of joy. If this world is [purely] Darwinistic in its form, then why is there beauty for the sake of beauty? Cultures are all relative, from pluralistic democracies to oppressive military juntas. Both forms of governments are the same! We are all beasts in the end, why even attempt to change society? Society can never be changed, because there are no absolutes. You shouldn't reform society or help the weak, because there is no reward. In fact, you could be hurting them, because who are you to decide what is best for other people?

Relativism is a cancer that can rot a society. Rejecting the necessity of an Architect has a potential to plague the moral courage and aptitude for taking on injustices. Evil philisophies based in Nietzche and hopeless Modern thought have showed what "realism" can do. One only has to look at a text book to see how fascism, Communism and despotism affected vast regions. That is why Mr. Miller is wrong.

Reclaiming What Is Rightfully His

I was listening to an interview on the radio a few weeks ago. There was a man on there who studied C.S. Lewis and discovered something very interesting about him and the Chronicles of Narnia. Dr. Michael Ward then wrote a book and also publishes a website about the discovery. His interesting thesis is: "The book argues that Lewis secretly based the Chronicles of Narnia on the seven heavens of the medieval cosmos." Lewis, Dr. Ward argues, wanted to reclaim the cosmos for the King. Lewis understood the importance of the heavens to the Medieval scholars and wanted to bring that back from the seculars who stole it. Lewis believed that the planets were 'spiritual symbols of permanent value.' He sought to place emphasis on what is rightfully God's.

What C.S. Lewis attempted to do in Narnia helps bolster my ideas about my passion. I believe that what things that have been taken by this world's spirit must be reclaimed. My passion of government and working to reform it truly is what I want to do. Frustration sets in periodically when I think how one person or a small group of individuals cannot effectively change what is wrong in this country. The Founders separated power so evenly that it slows the potential for corruption and that one bad person can step in and alter the course of our nation for worse. Of course, a George Washington figure could correct the ills of society, but more than often than not, a corrupt person would take the mantle of "reformer." Nevertheless, hope abounds in my heart.

When the pope was in the U.S. he gave a homily in Yankees Stadium. He stated there:

Praying fervently for the coming of the Kingdom also means being constantly
alert for the signs of its presence, and working for its growth in every sector
of society. It means facing the challenges of present and future with confidence
in Christ's victory and a commitment to extending his reign. It means not losing
heart in the face of resistance, adversity and scandal. It means overcoming
every separation between faith and life, and countering false gospels of freedom
and happiness. It also means rejecting a false dichotomy between faith and
political life, since, as the Second Vatican Council put it, "there is no human
activity - even in secular affairs - which can be withdrawn from God's dominion"
(Lumen Gentium, 36). It means working to enrich American society and culture
with the beauty and truth of the Gospel, and never losing sight of that great
hope which gives meaning and value to all the other hopes which inspire our
lives. (Complete message)

A Christian worldview does not cease to exist whenever we step into the rotunda of the US Capitol. A theologian at my Alma Mater used to say that Christ is not some measuring rod or some pie in the sky ideal. Christ is like a pair of spectacles that we put on. It integrates all that we have read, learned and experienced into a perspective. When we look through our faith, everything is tinted with the cross. We ought to see things according to his Word and according to revelation. Our life's goal is to help usher in the Kingdom of God, and that can be made possible even through the government.

In all aspects of life, we can bring the power of the King. Reclaiming what is rightfully His ought to be our life's ambition and the goal.

Anarchy Analyzed

In Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton sought to discuss a vast array of topics. One of those topics [briefly] discussed governments and the nature of system. Can there be a distinct Christian form of government? One that uplifts the downtrodden and places them on the sure footing of dignity. Aristocracy is among the worst of government, since the rich and powerful are natural leaders. There is little room for movement among the classes. Democracy is not the greatest forms forms of government, but nonetheless, it is surely better than other governments. As Winston Churchill famously observed, democracy is the worst form of government, except for every other form of government.

If democracy is the lesser of the evils and aristocracy is among the worst, than perhaps anarchy is the most destructive. Anarchy attempts to root out all forms of government, and with that, all societal structures. Anarchy is extremely problematic, because one can never get away from social constructs and government. Whenever there are two or more people, there needs to be some sort of order. If there is mayhem among the masses, then a new form of government arise. Whether it is a co-op or despotism, rules must be in place. Ironically, if one person attempts to live by themselves, they still cannot get away from law. The law of nature will always bind them and conscience will often hold someone captive. Anarchy is both idiotic and unrealistic. I'll take my bets with the worst form of government (besides every other) ever devised by men!